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THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

MEW YORE • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



THE PROPHETS OF 
ISRAEL 

FROM THE EIGHTH TO THE FIFTH 
CENTURY 

THEIR FAITH AND THEIR MESSAGE 



BY 
MOSES BUTTENWIESER, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR OF BIBLICAL EXEGESIS, HEBREW UNION 
COLLEGE, CINCINNATI 



•Dfom fnrk 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1914 

All rights reserved 



T&&* 

$% 



Copyright, igi4 

By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Set up and electrotyped. Published January, 1914 



M 29 19/4 

©CI.A3623S2 



TO MY FRIEND AND COMRADE, 

"THE WIFE OF MY YOUTH," 

WHOSE SHARE IN THIS WORK IS GREATER THAN I 
CAN ACKNOWLEDGE 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Foreword: Origin and Character of Egyptian Prophetic Litera- 
ture — Rise of Eschatology — Method and Scope xv 

BOOK I 

THE FAITH OF THE PROPHETS 
PART I 

Chapter I 

GENERAL SURVEY 

The Keynote of the Prophetic Preaching — The Importance of 

Jeremiah 3 

Chapter II 

THE TEMPLE-SERMON AND THE PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 
UNDER JEHOJAKIM 

i. The Originally Component Parts of the Temple-Sermon; its 

Genuineness 21 

2. Jeremiah's Trial and Conviction, and the Law, Deut. XVIII, 

15-22, Applying to the Case 24 

3. Jeremiah's Escape — The Reading of his Prophecies by Baruch 37 

4. Chap. XXV — Its Origin and Purpose 46 

Note on the Date of Jer. XVII, 19-27 49 

Chapter III 

THE PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH UNDER ZEDEKIAH. CRITICAL 
ANALYSIS OF CHAPS. XXXVH, XXXVEU, XXXIV, XXXH, 3D-5, 
XXI 

A. The Actual Facts of the Case 52 

B. Critical Analysis of the Prophecies and Biographical Records 

of the Period 55 

vii 



viii TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

i. XXXVII, 17-21 and XXXVIII, 14-27 55 

(a) XXXVIII, 14-27— The Legendary Account 56 

(b) XXXVII, 17-21— The Authentic Record 62 

2. XXXIV, 8-22 and XXXVII, 1-16— XXXIV, 1-7, XXXII, 

3-5, XXI, 1-14 and XXXVIII, 1-13 65 

(a) The Two Deputations from Zedekiah to Jeremiah, XXXVII, 

3, 7a — XXI, 1-3 — Both Accounts Legendary 67 

(b) The Original Beginning of the Narrative, XXXVIII, 1-13, 

and the Prophecy, XXI, 4-14- XXXIV, 1-7— XXXII, 
3-5 69 

(c) XXXIV, 8-22 and its Original Conclusion, XXXVII, 7D-10 

—The Original Place of XXXVII, 4, and 5 76 

Chapter IV 

THE CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 

i. Their Importance 80 

2. The Date of the Confessions 81 

(a) The Date of XX, 7-11, 13 S3 

(b) The Date of XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6 84 

(c) The Date of XVIII, 18-20 86 

3. The Completeness of the Confessions and of the Prophetic 

Writings in General from a Literary Point of View 87 

4. The Peculiarity of Biblical Style 91 

5. Analysis and Interpretation of the Confessions 95 

(a) The Confession, XV, 10, 15-21 and its Sequel, XVI, 1-9 95 

(b) The Confession, XVII, 5-10, 14-18 and its Originally Com- 

ponent Parts, IX, 22, 23, X, 23, 24, XVI, 19. Their 
Original Order 103 

(c) The Confession, XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6 115 

(d) The Confession, XX, 7-11, 13 121 

(e) The Confession, XX, 14-18 127 

PART II 
Chapter I 

INTRODUCTORY 

Jeremiah Could not Write 133 



TABLE OF CONTENTS ix 

Chapter II 

PAGE 

Inspiration as Opposed to Divination or Possession 138 

PART III 

Chapter I 

How the Prophetic Utterances Became Literature 167 

Chapter II 
The Prophets Believe the Doom Inevitable 176 

Chapter III 

Jeremiah's View of the Doom 179 

1. Chap. XIII, 15-27 180 

2. Chaps. XIV, 1-13 (19-XV, 4), XV, s-9 184 

3. Chap. IV, 3-31 195 

4. XXXVI, 3-7. Chaps. XXV and XLV 204 

(a) XXXVI, 3, 7 204 

(b) Chap. XXV 206 

(c) Chap. XLV 207 

5. Chap. XVIII, iff 208 

Chapter IV 

AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 

1. The Dominant Note of Amos' Preaching — The Certainty of 

Judgment 211 

2. Chap. V, 1-17 (Reconstrued) Corroborates this View 212 

3. Identity of the Written with the Spoken Prophecies 221 

4. Chap. VII, 1-9. History of Amos' Call — General Plan of his 

Prophecies 222 

5. Amos' Prediction of Doom Applies to the Whole Nation 225 

6. Why Amos Delivered his Message at Beth-el 237 

Chapter V 

hosea's view op the doom — essence of hosea's 
preaching 

i. The Unity of Chaps. I-III 240 

2. The Epilogue XIV, 2-9, Supplementary to the Description of 

His Future Hope in II, 16-25 244 



x TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

3. Chap. V, 15b- VI, 3 — Another Exposition of his Future Hope 247 

4. Note on the Original Order of Hos. I-III and the Original 

Place of II, 1-3 251 

Chapter VI 

isaiah's view of the doom and his attitude toward 
the political affairs of the day 

I. Opinions of Present Day Scholars 254 

~7 2. Isaiah's Earliest Prophecies 255 

(a) The Consecration Vision 255 

(b) His Future Hope — X, 21-23 258 

(c) IX, 7-X, 4+V, 250-30 261 

3. The Prophecies of the Following Periods 265 

4. The Theories Advanced in Explanation of Isaiah's Alleged 

Change of View Untenable 268 

5. Isaiah's Guiding Principle — Faith 269 

6. No Discrepancy in Isaiah's Prophecies 272 

(a) X, 20, 24-27-fXIV, 24-27. A Post-Exilic Product 273 

(b) X, 27C-34. One or Two Fragments — Irrelevant to the Ques- 

tion at Issue 275 

(c) XIV, 28-32. Another Post-Exilic Product 276 

(d) XVII, 12-XVIII, 6. A Number of Fragments which Admit 

of No Conclusion 278 

(e) XXIX, sa-b, 7-8. A Fragment or More Probably an Inter- 

polation 280 

(f) XXXI, 5-9. A Conditional Prediction 282 

(g) X, 5-19. God's Ultimate Reckoning With the Assyrian 

World-Power 285 

7. Isaiah's Last Prophecy — Chap. XXII, 1-14 287 

Resume 293 

Micah's View of the Doom 297 

BOOK II 

THE MESSAGE OF THE PROPHETS 
PART I 

Introductory 301 



TABLE OF CONTENTS xi 

AMOS 

PAGE 

Justice and Righteousness 302 

Spiritual Religion Versus Ritualistic Piety 308 

Righteousness the True Foundation of Society 323 

Supplementary Note :T 327 

Index of Scripture-Passages Discussed or Interpreted 331 

Index of Subjects 341 

Grammatical and Lexicographical Observations 349 



ABBREVIATIONS 



b. 


ben 


Diog. L. 


Diogenes Laertius 


Ges. Buhl, Worterbuch Gesenius, Hebraisches und Aramaisches 




Handworterbuch, bearbeitet von Buhl, 




14 und 15. Auflage 


Holmes & Parson 


Vetus Testamentum Graecum. Ed. Holmes 




et Parson, 1 798-1827 


K 


Kethlbh 


Kautzsch 3 


Kautzsch, Die Heilige Schrift des Alten 




Testaments, 3. Auflage 


Marti HC 


Kurzer Hand-Commentar zum Alten Testa- 




ment, herausgegeben von K. Marti 


Nowack HK 


Handkommentar zum Alten Testament, 




herausgegeben von W. Nowack 


Pes. 


Pesitta 


SBOT 


The Sacred Books of the Old Testament, ed. 




by P. Haupt 


s. v. 


sub voce 


Targ. 


Targum 


Vulg. 


Vulgata 


ZATW 


Zeitschrift f iir die Alttestamentliche Wissen- 




schaft 


ZDMG 


Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen 




Gesellschaft 


LXX 


Septuagint 


LXXK 


Codex Sinaiticus 


LXXA 


Codex Alexandrinus 


LXXQ 


Codex Marchalianus 


e 


Theodotion 



FOREWORD 

There is perhaps, at the present day, no subject of 
biblical study which possesses more interest for the 
lay public than Prophecy, a fact which must be most 
gratifying to writers on this subject, though it carries 
with it one serious difficulty. For there is also proba- 
bly no subject of biblical study which engages the 
attention of the specialists to the extent that Prophecy 
does; and a presentation which would fill the needs of 
the one class of readers would hardly meet the require- 
ments of the other. 

I cannot claim to have solved this difficulty. I am 
aware that there are parts of the present volume which 
the lay reader may prefer to pass over, and that there 
are other parts which may seem commonplace to 
the scholar, but I believe that this is almost inevitable 
in the present stage of biblical criticism. The general 
reader will probably find the first and the last chap- 
ter most readable, as these were originally lectures 
delivered before a lay audience, the first as an exposi- 
tion of the Faith of the Prophets, the second as an 
exposition of their Message. These lectures, which 
were delivered in Albany, N. Y. in January, iqio, at the 
request of my friend and former pupil, Rev. S. H. 
Goldenson, I was strongly urged to publish at the 
time. They are here substantially unchanged, though 
the second has been necessarily somewhat enlarged. 
In view of the fact that these surveys were based on an 
interpretation and a line of reasoning which are in 
many points at variance with those of the many 



xvi FOREWORD 

distinguished scholars who have written on the subject 
of prophecy, it would have been vain to publish them 
without giving the scientific basis for my presentation. 
This last I have essayed to do in the present volume, 
and I am not without the hope that the studies in- 
corporated herein (which have grown out of my 
lectures on the subject at the Hebrew Union College 
during the past fifteen years), may on some points 
open up new lines of thought, and throw a new light 
on certain vital questions connected with Israelitish 
prophecy. 

The last chapter, which might logically have been 
reserved for the second volume, has been included here 
in order that, as far as preexilic prophecy is concerned, 
the presentation of the subject in this first volume 
might, in a summary sense at least, be complete. 

The institution of prophecy, whose origin lies far 
back in the primitive stages of religious development, 
was common to all the religions of antiquity. It was 
indigenous to Israel, even as to the other nations of the 
Ancient Orient, whether near or remote; but in Israel 
there arose in the course of time another type, the 
so-called literary or spiritual prophecy, which from the 
very outset was a distinct species, in pronounced 
opposition to the popular, primitive prophecy. It is 
with the great representatives of this specific Israelitish 
type of prophecy and with their importance in the 
history of religious thought that the present work is 
occupied. 

Of recent years the uniqueness and originality of this 
literary phase of prophecy have been questioned by 
various writers, in view of the discovery of a number of 
Egyptian texts which have been claimed to show a 



FOREWORD xvii 

close kinship to Old Testament Prophecy and which, 
accordingly, have been regarded as the model and 
source of the latter. In regard to that text, however, 
to which the greatest importance has been attached 
(Papyrus Leiden 344 recto, dating from the XIX 
Dynasty, that is about 1300 B. C), A. H. Gardiner, 
by his edition and translation of the complete Papy- 
rus, 1 has proved that the conclusions drawn from it by 
Eduard Meyer, "Die Israeliten und ihre Nach- 
barstamme," (1906) pp. 45 iff., and others are without 
basis. He has shown that no part of the Papyrus has a 
prophetic character, and still less a Messianic outlook, 
not even the part originally published by H. O. 
Lange, on which those scholars prematurely based 
their deductions regarding the origin of Israelitish 
prophecy. Gardiner's conclusions, it may be well to 
add, have been fully corroborated by another dis- 
tinguished Egyptologist, A. Wiedemann (in "Archiv 
fur Religionswissenschaft," XIII, 1910, pp. 349-351). 
Wiedemann refers also to the second of these texts, 
which was discovered in a Papyrus in St. Petersburg, 
and which dates from around 1900 B. C., and very 
rightly points out (ib.) that the excerpt published of it 
by Golenischeff, 2 and the duplicate of a part of this 
text, translated by Ranke in Gressmann, "Altorien- 
talische Texte und Bilder," I, pp. 205f., are altogether 
insufficient to permit any positive conclusions. What 
remains of Egyptian prophetic literature is a third 
group of texts, which date either from the Hellenistic 
or the Roman period. These prophecies have been 

1 " The Admonitions of an Egyptian Sage." From a Hieratic 
Papyrus in Leiden (Papyrus Leiden 344 recto). Leipzig, 1909. 

2 In Recueil de Travaux relatifs d la philologie et d Varcheologie 
egyptiennes et assyriennes, XV, 1893, pp. 89/. 



xviii FOREWORD 

commonly thought to go back to Old-Egyptian origi- 
nals, to which Wiedemann cautiously remarks (ib.) 
that, though such older origin is possible, it cannot at 
present be proved. I would go farther than Wiede- 
mann and say that such older origin is out of the 
question. There is nothing to support such a theory 
except the claim of the authors of these prophecies, 
and this claim should be judged in the same light as 
the similar claims met with in apocalyptic literature, 
and, it may be added, also in the contemporaneous 
astrological literature. The authors simply thought 
to lend their predictions greater authority by labeling 
them as products of hoary antiquity. With this 
characteristic of these pseudonymous prophecies, 
as well as with their real time of origin, it accords that 
they are akin in their character and contents, not to 
prophetic literature proper, but to apocalyptic litera- 
ture, the oldest Old Testament products of which 
date from the close of the Persian and the beginning of 
the Hellenistic period. The simultaneous occurrence 
of apocalyptic texts in Egypt and in postexilic Juda- 
ism is, in all probability, to be accounted for by the 
fact that the rise and development of apocalyptic 
literature goes hand in hand with the spread and 
development proper of astrological literature (see 
p. 159, n. 1). As a matter of fact, a careful examina- 
tion of the two reveals the interesting fact that there 
is in some respects a very close relationship between 
astrological and apocalyptic literature, a relationship 
pointing clearly to a certain dependence of the latter 
on the former. In view of all this, I saw no occasion 
for referring to the Egyptian texts in the body of the 
present volume. 
By the foregoing remarks I have indirectly indicated 



FOREWORD xix 

my position also to the view, advanced by a recent 
school of biblical scholars, that Jewish eschatology 
existed fully developed in ancient Israel long before 
the appearance of literary prophecy and that its roots 
are to be sought in Old-Babylonian eschatological 
notions. It may suffice here to point out that the 
claim of the existence of an Old-Babylonian eschato- 
logical speculation rests on postulation rather than on 
established facts, and that — not to consider other 
objections — to argue the existence of an Israelitish 
eschatology from the preexilic prophetic writings is 
possible only by reading abstruse meanings and hidden 
references into descriptions which, in their essence, are 
purely imaginative and poetic. The fact is, as I hope 
to show in the second volume, that whatever there is of 
positive proof points to the rise of Jewish eschatology 
in the Persian period. Sellin, in his recent book, "Der 
alttestamentliche Prophetismus " (Leipzig, 1912), 
which has just come to my notice, differs in his view 
of the eschatology of Israel from the scholars just 
referred to in that he holds that eschatology was 
indigenous to Israel, his explanation being that "the 
real root of it lies in the act of Revelation from Sinai" 
(p. 182). I may add that Sellin's view-point through- 
out his treatise is in accord with this explanation. 

My treatment of the prophets, though it departs to 
a certain extent from the chronological order of 
presentation, is not in opposition to, but is in full 
harmony with the historico-critical method of modern 
research. This method means for that province of 
knowledge which deals with the politico-social and 
mental development of the human race, what the 
analytic-genetic method means for the province of 
science. Like the latter it insists that every fact or 



XX FOREWORD 

phenomenon under consideration be minutely ana- 
lyzed, that is to say, that its relation to its environment 
be determined, and its development and growth and, 
if possible, also its genesis, be traced. For it, also, 
emphasizes, as the guiding principle of modern re- 
search, that no real knowledge can be obtained from 
detached phenomena or isolated facts; in other words, 
that no fact can be accepted by itself, but must be 
recognized as a part of a great complex, the inter- 
relations of the various parts of which must be closely 
studied before the significance of the special phenom- 
enon can be ascertained. 

Up till recently, however, research in the field of 
literary prophecy can hardly be said to have fully 
complied with the demands of the analytic-genetic 
method. It concentrated its attention on the historic 
side of the problem, that is, on the development of the 
prophetic ideas and the composition of the prophetic 
writings, and neglected to a large extent the more 
vital side of the movement, the spiritual side. It 
failed to give due attention to the "inward" religion 
of the prophets, and this, after all, must be the investi- 
gator's primary concern. For, however important it is 
to trace the reflections and speculations which ulti- 
mately entered into the construction and shaped the 
expression of their views, their personal religion, the 
nature and quality of their inner experience, of their 
realization of their relation to God, can be the only 
basic starting-point. The touchstone of prophetic, as 
indeed of every, religion is not so much the particular 
interpretation of life and the universe to which the 
individual prophets were led, as it is the inner fire 
which was kindled in them and the active life of 
service and surrender to which they were inspired. 



FOREWORD xxi 

It is from this aspect, the aspect of the prophets' 
personal faith, that literary prophecy must be con- 
sidered first of all, in order to comply fully with the 
analytic-genetic method; and only after the spiritual 
side has been fully considered can the doctrinal side of 
the movement, that is the new world of religious ideas 
to which it gave birth, be appreciated in its true 
significance. This spiritual side of the prophetic 
movement, it has seemed to me, can be best studied by 
starting with it at the point of its highest development. 
Therefore, in the present volume, which aims, pri- 
marily, to be an exposition of this side of the subject, a 
departure from the chronological order of presentation 
has been made. 

It must further be noted, in explanation of my 
treatment of the subject, that not all the prophetic 
books have an equal value or a like character. Thus, 
to give only one illustration, the Book of Nahum is an 
example, among the preexilic prophetic writings, of the 
national chauvinistic prophecy, the representatives 
of which the true prophets never tired of denouncing. 
I have kept in view mainly the six great prophets, 
Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Micah, Jeremiah, and Deutero- 
Isaiah (Is. XL-LV). With these is to be classed, of 
preexilic prophets, Zephaniah, though by far not so 
great and original a personality as they, and of 
postexilic prophets, the author of Is. LVII, 15-LIX. 
Kinship of spirit with these great prophets must be 
claimed also for Zachariah (Zach. I-VIII), though 
marked originality must be denied him. His genius 
was not of the creative order. As to Ezekiel, though 
his importance for the subsequent religious develop- 
ment in Israel must be acknowledged, his place is 
not among the great prophets. His importance in a 



xxii FOREWORD 

study of the prophetic movement is not because of the 
nature of his personal faith, not because of his own 
spiritual conception of religion, but because of the 
practical effects of his teaching on the official religion 
of his day. 

In conclusion, just a word on the question on which 
at present biblical scholars are divided into two 
camps — the question whether monotheism originated 
with the literary prophets or was known long before 
their appearance. In the present volume I refer to this 
question directly only once, and then of necessity 
briefly. I hope to include a full discussion of this point 
in the second volume, and shall only state here that 
my study of the prophets has confirmed my convic- 
tion that the position of the Graf -Wellhau sen school 
on this question cannot be dislodged. However scant 
the references of the prophets are to the official 
religion of their times, in Judah as well as in Israel, 
they leave no doubt that monotheism was unknown in 
Israel prior to their advent. It may be noted also that 
the stories of the patriarchs, in the form in which they 
have come down to us, are thoroughly imbued with 
the prophetic spirit, and, there is proof, are the product 
of the final metamorphosis which these ancient stories 
underwent among the followers of the great prophets. 

In translating biblical texts, square brackets are 
employed in all those cases where there is no exact 
word-equivalent in the Hebrew original, but where the 
word is implied by the syntactical construction. 

Moses Buttenwieser. 

SCHLEUSSIG 

Southampton, Ontario, July, 19 13. 



BOOK I 
THE FAITH OF THE PROPHETS 

PART I 



THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

CHAPTER I 
GENERAL SURVEY 

THE KEYNOTE OF THE PROPHETIC PREACHING — THE 
IMPORTANCE OF JEREMIAH 

If one should attempt to sum up in a single sentence, 
at once the faith of the prophets and the most striking 
truth illustrated by the history of Israel, one could 
not do it more fittingly than by the sublime utterance 
of the prophet Zachariah: "Not by virtue of material 
strength and political power shall ye prevail, but by 
my spirit, saith the Lord." * 

It is a notable fact that throughout the centuries 
of its history Israel never really attained political 
prominence among the nations. In view of the favor- 
able situation of Palestine, right on the highroad of 
traffic between the countries farther east and those 
of the Mediterranean, Israel would seem to have had 
the opportunity of developing great political power 
and influence, but beyond the ambition cherished in 
this direction and the strides made toward this end, 
during the comparatively brief period of David's and 
Solomon's rule, this result was far from ensuing. 
David, by his consolidation of the kingdom and con- 
sequent multiplication of the nation's strength, laid 
the basis for commercial development and political 
1 Zach. IV, 6. 
3 



4 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

prosperity, and Solomon, by following up this advan- 
tage and developing the possibilities which the country 
offered for world-commerce, succeeded in giving Israel 
the much-coveted rank and standing among the na- 
tions. But the progressive policy of the country was 
short-lived, owing to the disruption of the kingdom 
which followed on Solomon's death. From this time 
on, as before its rise under David, Israel, when not 
actually subservient to other nations, was at least 
obliged to maintain its independence with a struggle. 
Political prestige among the nations it had none. As 
the ancient seer aptly expressed it, " It is a people that 
stands alone, that does not count among the na- 
tions." 1 

Not only politically, however, was Israel's standing 
insignificant. Along the lines of material and intel- 
lectual 2 progress its achievement was just as slight. 
In all matters of general culture Israel was distinctly 
receptive rather than productive. After conquering 
Canaan it did not create a civilization of its own, but 
adopted that of the native Canaanites, and later, that 
of the great Kultur-centres of the ancient world with 
which it came in contact. Neither in the useful nor 
fine arts, neither in science nor commerce were its 
achievements as a nation noteworthy. We read, e. g., 
of Solomon's sending to Phoenicia for skilled masons 
and artificers when building the Temple, and again, of 
his employing Phoenician sailors for the conduct of 
his fleet. 

Israel's originality lies, with the bulk of its achieve- 
ments, in another sphere, in a sphere of infinitely 
deeper concern for man's welfare than political great- 

1 Num. XXIII, 9. 

2 "Intellectual" is used here in the narrower sense of the word. 



GENERAL SURVEY 5 

ness or material advance. It became men's pathfinder 
in their search after the truth, after the knowledge of 
God; and it is in this sphere, the sphere of the spirit- 
ual, that Israel attained imperishable fame. Here its 
genius soared to heights never reached before, nor 
surpassed since; and, from this standpoint, it may be 
said without exaggeration that in the whole history of 
human progress no other nation has made such a 
mighty contribution to, or exercised such a lasting in- 
fluence on the thought of the world. 

This great realization was the fruit of the movement 
known as literary prophecy — that wonderful move- 
ment which was inaugurated by Amos, the shepherd 
of Tekoa, about the middle of the eighth century B. C, 
and which was continued after him by an unbroken 
line of prophets through upwards of three centuries, 
before, during, and after the exile. 

A unique and imposing spectacle is this procession 
of prophets, appearing as they did under untoward 
circumstances, transcending material conditions, tow- 
ering over their contemporaries, preaching by divine 
compulsion a doctrine which for their age had neither 
material basis nor historical warrant, bearing testi- 
mony in their words and in their lives to the truth 
expressed by Zachariah, "Not by virtue of material 
strength and political power shall ye prevail, but by 
my spirit, saith the Lord." For mark, not at the 
flood-tide of Israel's power did these prophets appear, 
but at a time when the national life was at its lowest 
ebb, even threatened with extinction; and, what is 
equally significant, although they came apparently to 
predict doom, they were essentially the apostles of 
faith and hope. 

Here, indeed, we have the very heart of the matter. 



6 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

The prophets were convinced that the nation must 
perish; they were haunted by the knowledge of their 
people's sinfulness and of the impending judgment. 
So possessed were they by this thought, that they 
were unable to consider other problems or conditions, 
except as subsidiary to it. But while brooding over 
the coming ruin of their people, they were saved from 
despair by the deeper spiritual insight which came to 
them, by the larger vista that opened up before their 
soul. They caught a glimpse, as it were, of God's 
larger purpose; and in this light realized that Israel 
was but part of the general plan, and that the present 
was but a step to the future. They had a vision — a 
wondrous one for their age — of the ultimate regenera- 
tion of mankind and the universal dominion of God ; 
and it was this vision and this faith that inspired them, 
and gave them courage to go forth and proclaim to a 
doomed people the message of hope they had received 
from God, the gospel of final deliverance from sin 
and error. 

To this glorious faith the writings of every one of 
the prophets bear evidence. It is the keynote of the 
whole prophetic movement. It dignifies even the 
least important of the prophetic books. Let us con- 
sider, e. g., the book of the postexilic prophet Zach- 
ariah, from which we have already quoted. Taken 
as a whole, the writings of Zachariah, when judged 
according to their literary merits, do not rank high; 
yet there is a ring of idealism in his prophecies which 
lends them both significance and charm, a towering 
trust by which one cannot but be impressed. 

The lofty vision of Zachariah's predecessor, Deutero- 
Isaiah, 1 had not been realized. The great prophet 
1 Is. XL-LV. 



GENERAL SURVEY 7 

of the exile had dreamed of Israel's restoration to 
glory and the subsequent regeneration of mankind, 
but such a fulfilment seemed now farther off than ever. 
The situation of the newly-returned exiles was most 
pitiable. They found themselves assailed by diffi- 
culties on all sides, even by discord within their own 
ranks. Worst of all, they were disheartened by the 
gloomy view which they perforce took of their own 
situation. Unable to rise above the sordid reality of 
the present, they failed to realize that confidence is as 
certainly a condition of victory as it is a result of it. 
In short, they lacked faith. 1 Not so, however, the 
prophet Zachariah. Where others saw but failure 
and disappointment, he had visions of a glorious 
transformation of things; he saw the promise of a 
triumphant future. When his contemporaries asked 
in wonder, how in the face of their most depressing ex- 
periences, he could still cherish such dreams, could 
have such faith, could still hope for the ultimate 
triumph of the good, the prophet in reply gave utter- 
ance to that great word with which I opened this 
chapter: "Not by virtue of material strength and 
political power shall ye prevail, but by my spirit, 
saith the Lord." 2 

Whence springs this ardent faith of the prophets? 
They themselves give us the answer. Their conscious- 
ness of divine inspiration and of immediate com- 

1 This state of affairs is reflected throughout the prophecies of both 
Zachariah (Zach. I- VIII) and his contemporary Haggai; cf. Zach. 
I, 12; III, 2; IV, 7a, 10a; VIII, 10, 13; Hag. I, 2-11; II, 3-5, 
11-14. 

2 Cf. Zach. IV, 6-10; VI, 15; VIII, 3-9, 13, 19, also II, 13, 15; 
see also my article, " Remarks on the Importance of Zachariah as a 
Prophet " in " Studies in Jewish Literature," issued in honor of 
Pres. K. Kohler (Berlin, 1913), pp. 71-73. 



8 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

munion with God is their fountain-light, the main- 
spring of their faith. 

Let us take the famous passage from Amos: "When 
the lion roars who can but fear; when the Lord God 
speaks who can but prophesy?" r Amos implies by 
this parallel that as the roaring of the lion irresistibly 
inspires fear, so does God's revelation to a man as 
inevitably impel him to prophesy. 

Still more explicit is Amos on this point in his 
declaration to Amaziah, the priest of Beth-El. Ama- 
ziah at the order of the king, had forbidden speech 
to Amos, telling him, "Flee for thy life to Judah" — 
i. e. } to the prophet's native country — "there thou 
mayest earn a livelihood by prophesying, but at 
Beth-El thou shalt not again dare to prophesy." 2 
To this Amos replied: "I am not a prophet nor the 
disciple of a prophet — I am a shepherd and a dresser 
of sycamores — but God took me from my flocks, 
bidding me go, prophesy against my people Israel!" 3 
By this seemingly contradictory assertion Amos 
meant to emphasize that he was not a prophet by 
profession, nor yet by his own choice — by profession 
he was a shepherd and a grower of sycamores — but 
that he had been compelled by the voice of God to 
leave his herds and to come to Beth-El to prophesy 
his people's doom. And so little did he heed the pro- 
hibition that he followed up his declaration just 
quoted with a new prophecy addressed particularly 
to Amaziah, 4 by which act of defiance he implied that 
the priest and the king could no more suppress his 
message than they could stay God's purpose. 

It was reserved for Jeremiah, however, almost 

1 Am. Ill, 8. 3 lb. 14, IS- 

*Ib. VII, 12, 13. *Ib. 16,17. 



GENERAL SURVEY 9 

two centuries later, 1 to portray the elemental force 
with which God's revelation took possession of him: 
"Thou, God, hast enthralled me, and I am en- 
thralled; thou hast seized and overpowered me!" 2 
Then he goes on to tell how his prophetic gift has 
brought shame and discredit on him, but still he must 
obey the divine force within him: 

"I have become a constant target for laughter; 
every one mocketh me. For as often as I speak I have 
to cry out, have to complain of violence and abuse, 
for the word of God but serveth to bring upon me 
insult and derision without end. And I thought I will 
not heed Him, I will not speak any more in His 
name; but it was within me as a raging fire shut up 
in my bosom; I strove to withstand it, but I could 
not." 3 

Just as this description of the force of divine in- 
spiration has no equal in prophetic literature, so no 
other prophet was possessed to such a marked de- 
gree as Jeremiah by the conviction of his divine call 
and by the consciousness of intimate communion 
with God. Other prophets showed equal fervor and 
singleness of purpose; some even, as the Isaiahs, 
excelled Jeremiah in the loftiness of their conception 
of God and of the universe, as in logical precision and 
clearness of thought, and in poetic beauty and aptitude 
of language — in fact, in all those qualities which per- 
tain distinctly to the intellectual side of the prophetic 

1 The date of the confession referred to here is 587 B. C, see Chap. 
IV, § 2, a. 

2 Jer. XX, 7. — I use "enthrall" not with the meaning "enslave," 
but with the meaning "to cast a spell over," to "hold or bring under 
an overmastering influence." 

3 lb. 7 b-o. 



io THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

movement; but as an exponent of the purely spiritual 
side of this movement Jeremiah stands without a 
peer. In support of this, one need only point to his 
writings, where with his prophecies proper he has 
interwoven his confession of faith and the record of his 
religious experience. Any discussion of the faith of 
the prophets must centre finally in this fervid record 
of Jeremiah's. 

Throughout the book of Jeremiah there is a strong 
personal note. At times, in the so-called confessions, 
e. g., the prophet's innermost soul is revealed to us. 
We see the man, his struggles and his sufferings, and 
we see the very pulse of the man — his unvarying 
reliance on God's presence with him. 

In the opening chapter, known as the consecration- 
vision, the prophet relates how God, in that hour when 
He revealed Himself to him, spoke the following 
words of assurance: 

"Be not afraid of them for I am with thee to deliver 
thee. . . . But do thou gird thy loins and rise and 
speak to them whatsoever I bid thee. Be not dis- 
mayed by them lest I suffer thee to be dismayed by 
them. Behold, I make thee this day as a fortified 
city, and as an iron pillar, and as a wall of brass 
against the whole land, the kings of Judah, her princes, 
her priests, and the people of the land; they shall 
wage war against thee but not conquer thee, for I am 
with thee, saith the Lord, to deliver thee." 1 

These words with which, the prophet states, God 
sent him forth on his mission are not mere phrases 
calculated to produce effect. Every word reflects 
the bitter struggle Jeremiah had to endure in the 
pursuance of his prophetic mission. One needs only 
*Jer.I,8, 17-19. 



GENERAL SURVEY n 

to recall the storm of opposition and persecution 
which his famous Temple-sermon 1 called down on 
his head. 

In this sermon Jeremiah denounces the people's 
belief in the inviolable sanctity of the Temple at 
Jerusalem, and declares that God will destroy the 
Temple and disperse the nation in order to show that 
He does not care for sacrifices and offerings, but solely 
for an obedient heart and a moral life : 

"Thus saith the Lord Sabaoth, the God of Israel, 
amend your ways and your doings that I may let 
you dwell in this place. Put not your trust in delu- 
sions like this, the Temple of God, the Temple of God, 
the Temple of God are these structures. 2 Nay, only 
if ye thoroughly amend your ways and your doings, 
if ye scrupulously practice justice toward one an- 
other, oppress not the stranger, the fatherless, or 
the widow, shed not innocent blood in this place, nor 
worship other gods to your hurt, only then will I let 
you dwell in this place, in the land which I gave 
to your fathers, forever. Verily, ye put your trust 
in delusions that are of no avail. [Think of it!] to 
commit theft, murder, adultery, and perjury, to 
sacrifice to Baal and worship other gods that ye know 
not, and then to come and stand before me in this 
house dedicated to my name and say, we are safe — 

1 VII, 1-15, 21-26; cf. Chap. II, § 1, "The Originally Component 
Parts of the Temple-sermon." 

2 Like most temples of antiquity, the Temple at Jerusalem con- 
sisted at that time as in New Testament times {cf. Math. XXIV, 1 
and Mark XIII, if.) of a number of buildings. As he spoke the 
words, "The Temple of God, the Temple of God, the Temple of God 
are these structures," Jeremiah no doubt pointed with a gesture to 
the Temple and its adjoining buildings. 



12 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

[safe] in doing * all these shameful things! Is this 
house, dedicated to my name, a den of robbers in your 
eyes? Verily, / do look upon it as such, 2 saith the 
Lord (vv. 3-1 1). 

"Thus saith the Lord Sabaoth, the God of Israel, 
add your holocausts to your common sacrifices, and eat 
the meat! For on the day I brought your fathers out 
of Egypt, I did not give them any command, nor did I 
say aught unto them, concerning holocausts or sacri- 
fices. But only this did I command them : Hearken unto 
my voice; have me for your God and be ye my people, 
and walk in the way that I ever enjoin upon you" — • 
i. e., by the divine voice within 3 — "so that it may be 
well with you" (vv. 21-23). 

1 l e ma'an has here, as quite frequently in such ironical comments, 
the force "so that," i. e., "to the effect that," or "with the result 
that." 

2 The preceding sentence, h a m e 'arath parislm haja habbajith hazztz, 
is to be construed as object of ra'ithi, a by no means infrequent con- 
struction; hinne serves the purpose of emphasizing 'anokhi, and gam, 
as need hardly be pointed out, receives its point from b ei enekhaem. 

3 ,a sazvzv(B is imperfect of reiterated action. That "I ever enjoin 
upon you" has the import here stated, follows directly from the whole 
tenor of the sermon as well as from the connotation which the terms 
"the revelation (Torah) of God" and "the word of God," invariably 
have in the prophetic writings. By his emphatic declaration in 
the preceding v. 22 Jeremiah implicitly denies the divine origin of the 
Deuteronomic Code or of any similar sacred lore, while throughout 
the sermon he insists on the divine and absolute authority of the 
moral law. Is it not clearly a postulate of this reasoning that it is 
through the moral consciousness that God communicates with man? 
The same reasoning underlies Amos' challenge to invite the occu- 
pants of the palaces of Ashdod and Egypt to Samaria to witness the 
lawlessness prevailing there and to testify against the house of Jacob 
(Am. Ill, 9 f., 13). Nowack, in explanation of this challenge, rightly 
remarks that Amos here proceeds from the premise, not of a written 
law known only to Israel, but of a universal law which asserts itself 



GENERAL SURVEY 13 

Are not these utterances the very quintessence of 
religion, even as we conceive of it to-day? — Not forms 
and ceremonies, but God in man's heart and in his 
daily life. 

To Jeremiah's contemporaries, however, as even to 
much later generations, such utterances seemed rank 
blasphemy, and as a result the whole nation united 
against him. He was condemned to death and only 
with difficulty escaped into hiding, from which he 
dared not emerge for over ten years, until the death 

in the conscience of every individual and every nation — an idea 
brought out very pointedly by Amos in Chap. I. (See "Die Kleinen 
Propheten" in Nowack's HK. ad loc). So too, the fact that "the 
word of God" and "the revelation (Torah) of God" to which the 
prophets peremptorily demand obedience invariably connote "the 
living prophetic word," points to the same postulate. The use of 
these phrases to introduce messages like Jeremiah's Temple-sermon 
is particularly instructive in this regard, cf. e. g., Is. I, 10. No less 
significant are vv. 4-5 of the resume of the Temple-sermon, given in 
Jer. XXVT, inasmuch as these verses correspond to VTI, 24-26, the 
immediate continuation of v. 23. These verses read: "Thus speaks 
the Lord, if ye do not hearken unto me by walking according to my 
Torah, which I have laid before you, that is, by hearkening unto the 
words of my servants, the prophets, whom I have zealously sent unto 
you though ye did not hearken unto them" — or as the LXX both 
here and VII, 26 pointedly read — "unto me." Note that walking 
according to God's Torah is expressly defined as hearkening to the 
words of the prophets, and that obedience to the prophets is in turn 
defined — in the text read by the LXX — as hearkening unto God. 
As a final link in this chain of evidence may be mentioned Jeremiah's 
sublime conviction that in the ideal future there will be no written 
code of law, but that God's law will be indelibly inscribed in the heart 
of each individual (XXXI, 31-34). As W. Robertson Smith expresses 
it, "God's Word, not in a book but in the heart and mouth of His 
servants, is the ultimate ideal as well as the first postulate of prophetic 
theology" (see "The Old Testament in the Jewish Church," p. 300). 
Cf. also infra Part II, Chap. II, "Inspiration as opposed to Divination 
or Possession," pp. 145s., 150, 156. 



14 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of Jehojakim made it safe for him again to appear in 
public. 1 How intense was the hatred of the people 
toward him and to what abuse he was subjected be- 
cause of the Temple-sermon may be seen from the 
confession, XV, 10, 15-21, which dates from this 
period, in which the prophet exclaims: "Woe unto me, 
my mother, that thou didst bear me, a man of strife 
and enmity for the whole land; I have not lent to them 
nor have they lent to me, yet everyone curseth me." 2 
This persecution which began with the Temple- 
sermon continued, except for a comparatively brief 
intermission, until the very close of Jeremiah's career ; 
it became even more violent toward the end. From 
the confessions of this final period we know that even 
his nearest relatives and most intimate friends joined 
the ranks of his persecutors and conspired against him : 
"Yea, even thy brothers, and the house of thy 
father, even they have become treacherous against 
thee, even they talk without reserve 3 behind thy back; 
do not trust them if they speak kindly to thee" 
(XII, 6). And again: "Yea, I hear the whispering of 
many, attack on all sides: inform on him or let us 
play the informer; every one of my bosom-friends is 
watching to contrive my downfall : 4 perhaps he will 
let himself be entrapped, so that we may get him into 
our power and take revenge on him" (XX, 10). 

1 See Chap. II, § 2, "Jeremiah's Trial and Conviction." 

2 Read kidldm qilHunl. 

3 male is elliptical for pe male (adverbial accusative) or b e phe male 
both of which phrases occur in Arabic mil'a fi, bimiVi ft; see Gold- 
ziher, " AH b. Mejmun al-Magribl and sein Sittenspiegel des ostlichen 
Islams" in ZDMG, XXVIII (1874), 310, n. 1. 

« saeW means "downfall," just as in Ps. XXXV, 15, XXXVIII, 18, 
Job XVin, 12; cf. Barth, "Wurzeluntersuchungen," p. 40 and Ges. 
Buhl, " Worterbuch " ^ s. v. 



GENERAL SURVEY 15 

No amount of persecution, however, could shake 
Jeremiah. Four years after the Temple-sermon a 
great fast was ordained throughout the country, 
probably on account of the peril threatening the 
nation because of Nebuchadrezzar's victory over 
Pharao Necho at Karkemish in the year 604; and 
Jeremiah evidently thought the occasion propitious 
for making an impression upon the minds of the people 
and rousing them from their indifference. — Had he not 
all these years been predicting the very disaster of 
which they now stood in dread? As the death-sentence 
was still hanging over him, he dared not leave his 
hiding-place to deliver his prophecies in person, 1 
so he had Baruch b. Nerijah write down all the 
prophecies he had delivered up to that time — he him- 
self did not know how to write 2 — and read them before 
the people, assembled from all quarters of the country, 
in the Temple at Jerusalem. 3 The result of this was 
that his sermons were burned by the King, and his 
life exposed to greater danger than ever ; 4 but, un- 
daunted, he caused his sermons to be rewritten, 5 
and this time took occasion to add a characteristic 
confession of his faith in God and in the power of 
things spiritual: 6 — "Let not the wise man boast of 
his wisdom, nor the mighty one of his strength, nor 
the rich man of his wealth, but if one must 7 boast let 
him boast of this, that he understandeth and knoweth 

1 See Chap. II, § 3, "Jeremiah's Escape." 

2 See Part II, Chap. I, "Jeremiah could not Write." 

3 See Jer. XXXVI, iff. 

4 See#>., w. 11-26. 

5 Seeib., w. 27-32. 

6 See Chap. IV, § 5, b, "The Confession, XVII, 51!. and its origi- 
nally Component Parts." 

7 See infra, pp. io8f. 



1 6 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

me — that I am the Lord who doth work love, justice, 
and righteousness in the world, that it is in these 
things that I take delight, saith the Lord" (IX, 22). 

These words reveal the essential spirituality of 
Jeremiah's teaching. Yet this man who preached love, 
justice, and righteousness was flogged, 1 imprisoned, 
thrown into a dungeon, treated with every sort of 
contumely. 

Physical suffering, however, seems to have been but 
a small part of what Jeremiah had to endure. In his 
confessions he speaks of suffering far more terrible 
than any persecution or bodily privation, viz., the 
joyless life of isolation which must be his because of 
his prophetic foresight. 2 This agony of soul which 
Jeremiah suffered because of the knowledge of the 
doom awaiting his people is reflected throughout his 
book. We see the prophet constantly beset by visions 
of the approaching catastrophe. The joys of life have 
become a mockery to him, his heart can never more be 
light. Whithersoever he turns, hideous shadows thrust 
themselves across his path and drive him out from 
the circle of life's joyous ones, yea, make it impossible 
for him to share the society of his fellow-men at all. 
He longs to flee from the haunts of men, where his 
forebodings have made him an object of derision and 
a laughing-stock for the crowd, to hide his grief in 
the solitude of the desert, and to bear his hopeless 
burden alone. What a heavy price the seer pays for 

1 Jeremiah was flogged on two occasions, when he provoked the 
ire of the Temple-overseer Pashhur (XX, 1-3) by his prediction that 
Jerusalem and the nation were doomed — an occurrence the date of 
which cannot be ascertained; and again later when he was thrown into 
the dungeon on the pretext that he intended to desert to the Chal- 
daeans (XXXVII, n-16). 

2 See XV, 17L; cf. Chap. IV, § 5, a, pp. 99E 



GENERAL SURVEY 17 

his gift! — the bitterest isolation, the renunciation of 
all domestic happiness, the inability even to share in 
the common joys and sorrows of his fellow-men, be- 
cause his soul is filled with pictures of the desolation 
and misery about to overtake his people. 1 

Yet through this constant anguish of spirit, as 
through the persecution he had to suffer from his 
fellow-men, Jeremiah was upheld by his belief that 
God was with him. Indeed, all his trials and suffering 
served but to strengthen his reliance on God and his 
consciousness of God's presence with him. Herein 
lies the secret of his power. No matter how often 
Jeremiah cries out that he is weary of life, since in 
God's service he has to bear the hatred of the whole 
world, he always ends by declaring that God is present 
with him, and that it is the joy of his soul to carry out 
His will, so that, as he himself puts it, he verily devours 
every message from Him. 2 The bitter complaint, 
cited above, that his enemies beset him on every hand, 
and that even his bosom-friends are ready to betray 
him, is followed up by the joyful exclamation, "But 
since God is with me, I triumph like a hero." 3 

Even more explicit, if possible, is another passage, 
in which, referring to the unceasing persecution he has 
to endure, Jeremiah reflects that those who are un- 
compromisingly righteous in their lives are beset with 
hardships and trials, while the unscrupulous wicked 
enjoy a life of ease and prosperity: 4 "Absolutely 

1 Cf. especially IV, 19-21, VIII, 16, 18, IX, 1, XIV, 18, XV, i7f., 
XVI, 1-9; see also Part III, Chaps. II, f. "The Prophets Believe the 
Doom Inevitable." 

2 See XV, 16. 

3 XX, n; cf. Chap. IV, § 5, d, "The Confession, XX, 7-11, 13." 

4 XII, i-2a. 



1 8 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

righteous art Thou, God," he calls out, "even 
though I venture to dispute with Thee, — yet of a ques- 
tion of justice I desire to speak unto Thee: Why 
is the way of the wicked prosperous, why are all 
faithless people at ease? Thou hast planted them, 
hence they take root, thrive, even yield fruit." For a 
moment this reversed order of things seems to him 
hardly reconcilable with the justice of God — but only 
for a moment. Then the truth comes to him: * "Near 
art Thou to their mouth" — i. e., the mouth of the 
wicked — "but far from their heart; but Thou, O God, 
Thou knowest me, Thou seest me ever, 2 Thou hast 
tried my heart which is at one with Thee." 3 He says 
in effect that in spite of the material prosperity of the 
wicked, he knows that no relation exists between them 
and God, whereas he feels that he has entered with 
God into such an intimate relation that nothing 
further can be desired; in this at-oneness with God 
he possesses the supreme good. In other words, 
he recognizes that not material prosperity constitutes 
man's happiness, but that peace and strength of soul 
which is enjoyed only by him who lives a life of right- 
eousness and feels himself at one with God. 

In this consciousness of union with God Jeremiah 
recognized the mainspring of all his endeavor, and 

1 lb. 2b, 3a. 

2 tir'eni is imperfect of reiterated action. 

3 Httakh is generally misunderstood; W. Erbt, " Jeremia und seine 
Zeit," p. 173, and Rothstein (in Kautzsch, "Die Heilige Schrift des 
Alten Testaments," 3 Auflage, ad loc.) omitted it altogether. The 
text is, however, perfect from the point of view of both thought and 
grammar, 'ittakh is not the objective of libbl but its qualificative. 
The qualificative consisting of a prepositional phrase is used in the 
Semitic languages to an extent altogether unknown in modern 
languages; it is often to be rendered by a relative or temporal clause. 



GENERAL SURVEY 19 

from it he derived his conviction of victory notwith- 
standing apparent failure. 

This explains why the prophet of the deepest gloom 
and most extreme personal privation is at the same 
time the prophet of the most ardent hope. For as 
Jeremiah is, throughout, the one of all the prophets 
most swayed by God's revelation, most possessed by 
the consciousness of his divine call, so, more fervently 
than any other prophet, does he bear testimony to his 
conviction that he was called to pave the way for God's 
future dominion — that it was his mission but to sow 
the seed, that the harvest would be reaped in some fu- 
ture age. Is not the very acme of zealous faith dis- 
closed by his account of how, in the face of the siege of 
the city by the Chaldaeans, he bought property at the 
behest of God from his cousin Hanameel, and of how he 
carefully arranged for the preservation of the deed for 
future ages — in token of his conviction that the cities 
would be reinhabited and the land cultivated again. 1 

Jeremiah's hope, however, did not end with the 
future material welfare of his people; his hope was 
for the spiritual regeneration of all mankind. Char- 
acteristic evidence of this is that confession which 
he had added to the second collection of his prophecies 
after the first had been burned by the King, that con- 
fession in which he reveals the faith and the hope that 
illumined his whole inner life and sustained him 
through all his persecution, — the faith that God, who 
was his power and his strength, would be his refuge in 
the hour of need, even on the day of the downfall of 
the nation; 2 the hope that through this downfall his 
people would ultimately be led to God. 

1 XXXII, 1-15. 

2 XVI, 19, XVII, 14-18. 



20 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

This was the hope which inspired Jeremiah to look 
beyond the tragedy of his people's doom; this his hope 
for his people, that though they must first be de- 
stroyed, they would flourish again at some future day 
when the nations would come from the ends of the 
earth to confess to God, " Verily our fathers inherited 
but falsehoods, empty beliefs which are of no avail." * 
1 XVI, 19. 



CHAPTER II 

THE TEMPLE-SERMON AND THE PERSECU- 
TION OF JEREMIAH UNDER JEHOJAKIM 

In the foregoing chapter the statement was made 
that any discussion of the faith of the prophets must 
centre in the fervid record which Jeremiah has left of 
his inner life. Inasmuch, however, as this record dis- 
closes itself as the immediate product of the persecu- 
tion which he had to suffer from his fellow-men, it 
behooves us, first, to fix our attention on the circum- 
stances and nature of this persecution, the more so 
as the prevailing views of Jeremiah's persecution and 
prophetic activity are in certain vital points open to 
question. 

And since the first real persecution on the part of 
the nation at large was called forth by the Temple- 
sermon, which in this sense may be said to mark the 
first crisis in Jeremiah's prophetic career, a discussion 
of this sermon and of its results for Jeremiah will 
occupy the present chapter. 

I. THE ORIGINALLY COMPONENT PARTS OF THE TEMPLE- 
SERMON; ITS GENUINENESS 

The Temple-sermon did not originally include the 
whole of VII, i-VIII, 3, but must have consisted of 
VII, 2-15, 21-26. There are various reasons why 
VII, 27-VIII, 3 are to be considered a separate sermon 
or a fragment of one, and VII, 16-20 as originally 
having formed a part of the same. (1.) Verse 27b, as 

21 



22 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

is generally conceded, does not seem to be original 
text; the LXX did not read it, and instead of "And 
thou shalt speak all these words unto them" (27a) 
and the opening phrase, "And thou shalt say unto 
them," of 28, they simply read w e, amarta ,a lehaem 
y aeth haddabhar hazzce, "And thou shalt say this word 
unto them." This, however, like the "And thou shalt 
say unto them" of VIII, 4, sounds like the concluding 
phrase of the headings which preface a number of 
Jeremiah's sermons. These headings give the date of 
the sermon, the circumstances that inspired it, and the 
place where it was delivered, and conclude with the 
stereotyped phrase, "And thou shalt say unto them" 
(or "And thou shalt say this word unto them," 
or "And thou shalt proclaim these words," as the case 
may be.) 1 (2.) VII, 1-15, 21-26 are a denunciation of 
the people's mistaken belief in the inviolable sanctity 
of the Temple at Jerusalem and in the divine authority 
of the sacrificial cult; while vv. 16-20, 28-VIII, 3 refer 
to the sacrificing of children and the worshipping of 
I star and the other gods of the Assyrian-Babylonian 
Pantheon. (3.) VII, 2 iff. have no connection with 
vv. 16-20, but are the logical continuation of 3-15; 
while w. 16-20, which, as Duhm points out, 2 break 
the sequence of thought, are clearly not in their 
proper context. 3 (4.) Additional proof that vv. 16-20, 
28-VIII, 3 did not originally belong here with VII, 
1-15, 21-26 is furnished by Chap. XXVI, which, be- 

1 Cf. VII, 1 (note also XXVI, 1, 2), XIX, 1, 2, 3a, XXII, 1, 
XXXIV, 1, 2. 

2 "Das Buch Jeremia," pp. 74 and 78. 

3 Giesebrecht ("Das Buch Jeremia," 2 , prefatory remarks to 
Chap. VII) also notices that vv. 16-20 break the sequence of thought, 
but fails to draw the proper conclusion from this fact. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 23 

sides relating in detail the date and place of the ser- 
mon and the disastrous consequences it had for Jere- 
miah, gives a brief resume of it. This resume applies 
perfectly to VII, 2-15, 21-26; it gives unmistakably 
the gist of these two parts, but has no application, 
no reference whatever to the intervening w. 16-20 or 
to the following piece, 2 8- VIII, 3. 

Duhm's view that w. 2-16, 21-26 are the work of 
later compilers, based on Baruch's report of the 
Temple-sermon, 1 is obviously not compatible with 
methodical criticism. The sermon bears all the 
earmarks of Jeremiah's authorship. It is the most 
passionate denunciation of the sacrificial cult that has 
come down to us in prophetic, or for that matter, in 
any literature; w. 25-26 excepted, every utterance 
falls like the blow of a sledge-hammer. The prophet 
declares that only the moral law is binding and of 
divine authority, that to the Israelites in the wilder- 
ness God commanded no laws whatever concerning 
sacrifices, and this, it must be remembered, he declares 
in the face of the recently promulgated Deuteronomic 
law claiming divine origin for the sacrificial cult. 
Thus to stamp the nation's holiest beliefs as mockery 
and delusion required the penetration, the uncom- 
promising character, and the boldness of a Jeremiah. 
Indeed, the sermon is in every respect consistent with 
Jeremiah's ideals and beliefs. The sweeping rejection 
of a purely ritualistic religion, on the one hand, and 
the positive view, on the other, that the moral law 
implanted in the human heart is alone authoritative, 
proceed from Jeremiah's experience of the power of 
the divine within himself, and accord with his ideal 
of the future consummation as expressed in Chap. 

1 Op. cit., pp. 7sff., 8off. 



24 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

XXXI, 3 1-34. 1 Such a vital message could not pos- 
sibly be the product of compilers. 

2. jeremiah's trial and conviction 

The authentic record of the consequences which 
the Temple-sermon had for Jeremiah is found in 
Chap. XXVI, one of the fortunately frequent bio- 
graphic chapters of the Book of Jeremiah. This chap- 
ter relates that Jeremiah's prediction that the Temple 
would be destroyed and the nation dispersed caused 
an uproar among the priests, prophets, and assembled 
people, and that no sooner had Jeremiah finished his 
sermon than he was seized and declared to have in- 
curred the death-penalty. When news of this reached 
the Sarim, i. e., the high officials of the state, they at 
once went from the King's palace to the Temple and 
opened the trial. The court, it is important to note, 
was composed of the Sarim and the people. That this 
was the practice in ancient Israel in cases of capital 
punishment we know from other sources; and that 
it was followed in this particular case we know from 
the fact that the verdict was pronounced by the Sarim 
and the people together (see v. 16), and from the fur- 
ther fact that the prosecuting priests and prophets in 
addressing the court mentioned expressly both the 
Sarim and the people (v. 1 1) . Moreover, as the words, 
"as you have heard with your own ears," spoken on 
this occasion by the priests and prophets in addressing 
the court, could properly apply to the people only — 
the Sarim not having been present when Jeremiah 
delivered his prophecy — it stands beyond doubt that 
the people had a voice in the matter and were not 
simply bystanders. 

1 See Book H, Part I, pp. 3i8f, 322L 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 25 

After the priests and prophets had demanded that 
he be sentenced to death, Jeremiah, speaking in his 
own defence, declared that he had been sent by God to 
prophesy against the Temple and the city everything 
that they had heard ; and he admonished them accord- 
ingly to heed God's word and not to incur additional 
guilt by killing an innocent man. In conclusion he 
reaffirmed his claim that he had been sent by God. 

Verse 16 continues: 

"Then the Sarim and the people spoke to the 
priests and the prophets, this man does not deserve 
the death-penalty, for he hath spoken unto us in the 
name of Yhwh our God" (Jen Wis hazzce mispat 
mawaeth ki b e semjahw<z ,e lohenu dibbaer 'elenu). 

On the ground of the first part of this verse it is 
generally held that Jeremiah was acquitted; and the 
second part is understood accordingly as proving 
that by his defence Jeremiah convinced his lay judges 
that he was a true prophet of Yhwh. This being the 
case, they could not but acknowledge his right and 
authority to speak, and, naturally, they were afraid 
to put him to death as the priests and prophets de- 
manded, for fear his prophecies might be fulfilled. 1 
There are, however, serious difficulties in the way of 
accepting this interpretation of the verse. 

(1.) Verse 16 is followed in w. 17 and 18 by the 
following statement: 

"Thereupon some of the elders of the country rose 
and spoke to the whole folk-tribunal, Micah of Mare- 
shah prophesied in the days of Hezekiah, king of 
Judah, and told all the people of Judah, thus saith 

1 See Cornill, "Das Buch Jeremia," ad loc and Einleitung, p. XXX; 
Duhm, op. cit. ad loc; Giesebrecht, op. cit. ad loc; Erbt, "Jeremia und 
seine Zeit," p. 11. 



26 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Yhwh Sabaoth, Zion shall be ploughed into a field, and 
Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the Tem- 
ple-mound shall be turned into wooded heights. Did 
Hezekiah and all Judah put him to death? Did 
they l not rather fear Yhwh and beseech Yhwh, so 
that Yhwh repented of the evil which he had de- 
creed against them? But we are bent on doing 2 a 
great wrong bringing guilt upon ourselves." 

If, as v. 1 6 reads, Jeremiah was acquitted, acquitted 
moreover, because the Sarim and the people realized 
that he was sent by God, what possible need or 
justification could there be for such a defence on the 
part of the elders? Giesebrecht notices this discre- 
pancy as well as another to be mentioned presently, 
but ascribes it to the fact that the chapter was pre- 
sumably not dictated by Jeremiah, but was the work 
of Baruch. 3 This, however, explains nothing, as we 
have no reason to suppose that Baruch did not know 
what he was writing about. Duhm's explanation is 
still less credible: "Nachdem Jeremia schon gerettet 
ist, kommt ihm noch eine unerwartete Unterstiitzung" 4 
If Jeremiah had just been acquitted, there would be no 
sense in this belated plea in his behalf. The words, 
"but we are bent on doing 5 a great wrong bringing 
guilt upon ourselves," with which the elders concluded 
their plea, would imply that Jeremiah had not been 
acquitted at all, but, on the contrary, that he had 
been sentenced to death. 

1 Read .7V w in accordance with the LXX, Pes., & Vulg. 

2 See infra, pp. io8f. 

3 Op. cit. prefatory remarks to Chap. XXVI. 

4 Op. cit. ad loc. 

6 By the use of the participle here resolution is expressed; cf. infra, 
pp. io8f. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 27 

(2.) Verses 20-23, which are connected with the 
preceding part by w e gam, go on to relate how "at the 
same time another man, Urijah b. Shemajahu of 
Kirjath ha-Yaarim, appeared as prophet in the name 
of Yhwh Qfsem jahwce) and prophesied against this 
city and this country precisely after the manner of 
Jeremiah's words." And when the king Jehojakim 
and the Sarim heard of his words they * sought his 
life, whereupon Urijah fled to Egypt. But by the 
king's order he was brought back from Egypt and 
executed. That Urijah's prophecy did not precede 
but followed that of Jeremiah may be deduced with 
certainty from "precisely after the manner of Jere- 
miah's words," which is equivalent to 'precisely as 
Jeremiah had prophesied;' had Urijah's prophecy 
been the prior event the comparison would have been 
reversed. Instantly, however, the question rises, if 
Jeremiah had just been acquitted, acquitted even 
with expressions of reverence for his person and his 
mission, why should Urijah under precisely similar 
circumstances have been dealt with so implacably? 
Moreover, on what authority of the law could the 
king and the Sarim without due trial order Urijah's 
execution, if there were no precedent to warrant such 
a summary procedure? Such a course would be con- 
trary to all that we know about the legal customs and 
jurisdiction of the king and the Sarim in ancient 
Israel. Even when, later, during the siege of the city 
by the Chaldaeans, Jeremiah was considered guilty of 
treason, and Zedekiah had empowered the Sarim to 
deal with him as they wished, this body did not ven- 
ture to kill him without a trial, but had him thrown, 
instead, into a miry cistern where he might perish. 2 
1 In accordance with the reading of the LXX. 2 See XXXVIII, 1-6. 



28 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

(3.) The report about Urijah's fate is followed up 
by v. 24: "But Ahikam b. Shafan protected Jeremiah 
so that he was not delivered up to the people to be 
put to death." The only inference possible from this 
plain, unequivocal statement is that Jeremiah had 
been condemned to death, and that he would have been 
executed had not Ahikam interfered. Duhm's at- 
tempt to reconcile this verse with v. 16 * may be passed 
over. Verse 24 cannot possibly be reconciled with 
v. 16, for the latter, as the text now reads, states that 
Jeremiah was acquitted by the Sarim and the people 
constituting the court, while the former states in 
plain words that, without the protecting hand of 
Ahikam, Jeremiah would have been handed over to 
the people for execution (in accordance with the law 
and custom in cases of this category; cf. Deut. XIII, 
10, XVII, 7, also Lev. XXIV, 14, 16, Num. XV, 35L). 

(4.) One cannot but ask, 'What new fact did 
Jeremiah present to the Sarim and the people by his 
assertion that he was sent by Yhwh to prophesy as 
he did?' Was not every word that he uttered in his 
sermon spoken in the name of Yhwh? Why then did 
not his sermon arouse fear and trembling in the people 
and cause them to bow to the divine authority by 
which he spoke, instead of inciting them to demand no 
less emphatically than the priests and prophets that 
he be put to death? In truth, that Jeremiah's persist- 
ent claim to divine authority could not possibly have 
had any such weight with the people as v. 16 would 
seem to imply, is shown clearly by v. 9, in which the 
frenzied people ask Jeremiah, "Why didst thou 
prophesy in the name of YHWH (b e sem jahwce), this 
Temple shall become like Shilo, and this city shall be 

1 Op. cit. ad loc. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 29 

devastated, shall become destitute of inhabitants? " 
It is obvious that the words, b e sem jahwce "in the 
name of Yhwh," are the real point in this question. 
The fact that the prophecy was uttered in the name 
of Yhwh clearly formed an incriminating circum- 
stance. Note the similar significant addition of b e sem 
jahwce in the ultimatum of the priests of Anathoth 
mentioned by Jeremiah in XI, 21: "Thou shalt not 
prophesy in the name of Yhwh (b e sem jahwce) , that 
thou die not at our hand." In fact, that in all such 
cases it was not the prophesying per se which consti- 
tuted the real offence, but the prophesying in the name 
of YHWH, is evident from the explicit proviso in the 
Deuteronomic law, Deut. XVIII, 15-22. 

Strange to say, this law has always been interpreted 
as if it were written from the point of view of the lit- 
erary prophets, that is, as if the literary prophets' 
standard of true and false prophets were at the basis 
of it. 1 

Obviously, however, there is a radical error in such an 
interpretation. The authority of the literary prophets 
from Amos to Jeremiah was never recognized by the 
exponents of the official religion of their age. If not 
constantly persecuted, as was Jeremiah, or forbidden 
speech and expelled from the country, as was Amos, 
the literary prophets were invariably met with scorn 
and derision, often even with hostility (cf. Hos. IX, jf ., 
Is. XXVIII, of., XXX, iof.). On the other hand, 
their opponents, whom they denounced as false proph- 
ets, were regarded by their contemporaries as the true 
mouthpieces of Yhwh, the authoritative interpreters 

1 Cf., e. g., Driver, "Deuteronomy" (in the International Critical 
Commentary), Steuernagel, " Deuteronomium " (in Nowack's HK.), 
Bertholet, "Deuteronomium" (in Marti's HC), ad loc. 



30 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of his will. In view of this fact, it is clear that the law, 
Deut. XVIII, 15-22, dating from the time of Jere- 
miah's prophetic activity, must have been intended to 
safeguard the religious beliefs of the people, which 
were felt to be menaced by the preaching of the liter- 
ary prophets; and, accordingly, verse 22 will be seen at 
once to have a very different meaning from the one 
hitherto ascribed to it. Verse 22 has invariably been 
taken, by modern as well as by ancient exegetes, as 
meaning to say that by the non-fulfilment of his 
prophecy the prophet shall be recognized as a false 
prophet. Now, as a matter of fact, Deut. XIII, 3, 4 
says precisely the opposite of this (Bertholet to the 
contrary), 1 viz., that Yhwh may permit "the sign and 
wonder'' of the false prophet to be fulfilled in order to 
test the people's belief in Him. Further, the custom- 
ary rendering of v. 22 is hardly logical in view of v. 20, 
which commands the people to put to death the false 
prophet. If the prophet's status should be deter- 
mined by the fulfilment or non-fulfilment of his proph- 
ecy, a result which could be ascertained only after the 
lapse of time, perhaps of years, such a command would 
be meaningless. Conviction at the time the prophecy 
was delivered would be impossible. 

By reason of these facts, the customary interpreta- 
tion of v. 22 is untenable, even if Jer. XXVIII, 9 be 
understood as laying down the rule that in the event 
a prophet predicts good, he shall by the fulfilment of 
his prophecy be recognized as truly sent by God. The 
fact of the matter is, however, that Jeremiah uses 
irony in this verse. The nation is so iniquitous in his 
eyes that he scouts the idea that an inspired prophet 
could predict anything but evil. His summary denun- 
1 Op. cit. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 31 

ciation of Hananiah as a false prophet in vv. 12-16 1 
accords with this, as does also the fact that, as regards 
himself and his predecessor-prophets, he considers 
it self-evident that their prophecies bear the stamp 
of truth in themselves and require no proof beyond 
this. There is thus a close relation between Jer. 
XXVIII, 8, 9 and XXIII, 16-22, and, read in the light 
of the latter, the meaning of the former is at once clear. 
What Jeremiah really means to say is that the proph- 
et's own consciousness, his inward conviction, is the 
incontrovertible proof of his divine calling — a concep- 
tion of prophecy concurred in either directly or in- 
directly by every one of the great literary prophets. 
Indirectly they furnished proof that this was their 
idea by the fact that they, one and all, truthfully 
preserved even those prophecies in which their predic- 
tions had been disproved by the actual outcome of 
events; thus they showed that whether their prophe- 
cies were literally fulfilled or not had no weight what- 
ever with them, was not considered by them at all 
as a criterion of divine calling or inspiration. 2 

It is thus clear that the usual interpretation of 
Deut. XVIII, 22 has no raison d'etre other than the 
preconceived idea with which later ages approached 
the verse. The translation of the verse, as required 
by what we pointed out to be the historical basis of 
the law, w. 15-22, must be as follows: 

7/ it happen that a prophet pronounceth in the name 

1 Verses 12-16 are the immediate continuation of vv. 1-11; 
wajjelaekh jirm e jd hannabhl l e darko ("and the prophet Jeremiah went 
his way"), nb, is interpolated; the interpolation, as Cornill, op. cit. 
ad loc, rightly showed, grew out of the misunderstood halokh of the 
phrase halokh w^amarta of v. 13. 

2 Cf. infra, pp. 15 iff. 



32 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of YEWE that which shall not be or occur, 1 that is the 
word which YEWE hath not spoken; presumptuously 
hath the prophet pronounced it: you shall not be afraid 
of him" 

The words, "which shall not be or occur," find 
their explanation in the express declaration, Deut. 
XIII, i, that none of the commandments enjoined in 
this code should ever be altered or abolished. The 
verse is aimed at such prophetic utterances as Am. 
V, 21-25, Hos. VI, 6, VIII, 11-13, Mic. VI, 6-8, Is. I, 
11-17, Jer. VII, 2ifL, which declare that the sacrificial 
cult has no divine authority. The meaning of the 
verse is that the false prophet is to be recognized by 
his speaking in defiance of the Law, which is eternally 
and absolutely binding. 

The law as a whole substantiates this interpretation. 
Verses 15-19 define indirectly the qualifications of the 
true prophet. In accordance with the people's demand 
at Horeb, Yhwh will raise up among them a prophet 
like Moses, who will expound His Law and interpret 
His will, and unto whom they shall hearken — the 
deduction from this being that the true prophet must 
first of all recognize the absolute authority of the 
divine Law (in accordance with Deut. XIII, 1), and 
further, that it must be his foremost mission to im- 
plant obedience to the Law in the hearts of the people. 
(Illustrations of prophetic activity of this type are 
Ezekiel's religious constitution for the future nation, 
Ezek. XL-XLVIII, and the sermon, Jer. XVII, 
19-27, dating from the time of Ezra and Nehemia, 2 

1 By the synonymous phrases, Id jihja w e lo jabho, emphasis is 
added. 

2 See Note on the Date of Jer. XVII, 19-27, at the end of the 
chapter. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 33 

which has for its object to exhort the people to observe 
the Sabbath.) 

Verses 2ofL deal with the prophet who has no claim 
to obedience, and who under no condition must be 
accepted as true, specifically, the prophet who pro- 
nounces in the name of Yhwh what Yhwh has not 
enjoined. The prophet who speaks in the name of 
other gods is also referred to, but as this case was 
taken up fully in XIII, 2-6, it receives only cursory 
mention here. The reason that both cases are classed 
together in this law is, doubtless, that from the point 
of view of the lawgiver, the case of the prophet who 
speaks in defiance of the Law, and the case of the 
prophet who speaks in the name of other gods fall, in 
reality, in one and the same category, inasmuch as 
both tend to the same result, the estrangement of the 
people from the worship of Yhwh as laid down by the 
Law. The law prescribes that, " even as he who speaks 
in the name of other gods," a prophet who pronounces 
what Yhwh has not enjoined shall be put to death, 
that is, as vv. 20 and 21 expressly define, if he speaks 
in the name of YHWH: "But the prophet who pre- 
sumes to speak in my name (jbiSmt) . . ." (v. 20), 
"H it happen that a prophet pronounces in the name 
of YHWH Qfsem jahwce) . . ." (v. 22). There are, 
it will be noted, two conditions specified, that the 
prophet deliver a message that is contrary to the Law, 
and that he deliver this message in the name of Yhwh. 
Strangely enough, biblical scholars hitherto have 
failed to note the importance of the second condition; 
they have looked upon b e sem jahwce and the virtually 
identical bismi as a conventional phrase contributing 
nothing to the general sense. Yet it will be readily 
seen that in reality it states the condition sine qua 



34 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

non. In view of the fact that in those days not only 
the religious law but the civil law and even the cus- 
toms of daily life were believed to rest on divine 
authority, and as prophecy was looked upon as the 
medium through which the divine will was communi- 
cated — "prophecy" meaning "the word from God" or 
"from the gods," and "prophet," "interpreter of the 
word and will of God " or " of the gods" — a message not 
delivered in the name of Yhwh would not have to be 
considered seriously (unless, of course, it was delivered 
in the name of other gods, in which case it would come 
under the law, XIII, 2-6) ; in fact, it would not sim- 
ulate the prophetic message at all, inasmuch as it did 
not make any claim to divine authority. To declare 
what is contrary to the Law might be reprehensible in 
itself — this point need not occupy us — but to declare 
what is contrary to the Law in the name of Yhwh, 
i. e., to claim divine authority for such a false message 
would be blasphemous; and it was precisely such cases 
that the law, Deut. XVIII, 15-22, was intended to 
cover. 1 

Now when we come to consider the case of Jeremiah 
in the light of this Deuteronomic law, at once two 
things become clear. The first is that, in view of this 
law, the priests and the legally recognized prophets, 
both, by virtue of their office, the legitimate guardians 
of the law (in addition to w. 18, 19, cf. Deut. XVII, 
8-12, XXXIII, oi.), could not do otherwise than 

1 From the explanation of this law as given in these pages, it follows 
that there is no ground for the view, held by various scholars, that this 
law did not form a part of the law-book promulgated in the days of 
Josiah, but originated later. Marti in Kautzsch, 3 ad loc, and A. F. 
Puukko, "Das Deuteronomium" (1910), pp. 254L, are the latest 
advocates of this theory, both considering this law the work of the 
Redactor. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 35 

demand that Jeremiah be put to death for his proph- 
ecy, Jer. VII, 1-15, 21-26; for in declaring that no 
sanctity was to be attributed to the Temple at Jeru- 
salem any more than to Shilo of old, and that the 
sacrificial cult had no divine authority, Jeremiah 
struck a blow at the very root of the Deuteronomic 
reformation. In the eyes of his contemporaries he 
was undermining their most sacred institutions, was 
declaring in the name of Yhwh, "what shall not be or 
occur." Jeremiah himself tells us in Jer. XVIII, 18 
that it was for the safeguard of the Law that he was 
persecuted: "Come, let us plot against Jeremiah, that 
the Torah of the priest, and the counsel of the sage, 
and the revelation of the prophet may not be imper- 
illed" l (cf. VIII, 8). It cannot be objected that 
Micah's prophecy of the destruction of the Temple at 
Jerusalem had no such serious consequences for him, 
for, as far as we know, there did not exist at that time 
any law that would apply to such cases; and further, 
it will be remembered, in Micah's time the Temple 
at Jerusalem, though held inviolable, was not vested 
with the supreme sanctity and authority which in 
Jeremiah's days accrued to it in consequence of the 
promulgation of the Deuteronomic Law and the 
centralization of the cult. 2 

The second thing that becomes clear is that, far from 

1 kl of kl Id thobhad has the force of a consecutive particle; if an 
existing state of affairs were referred to, as Rothstein in Kautzsch, 3 
Duhm, op. cit. and Cornill, op. cit. wrongly assume in their rendering 
and interpretation of the verse, the perfect and not the imperfect 
would have to be used, as e. g., VII, 28, XLIX, 7; Ezek. XII, 22, 
XXXVII, 11. Other examples of the use of kl as consecutive parti- 
cle in a negative sentence are: kl Id 'abho, etc., I Sam. XXIX, 8; kilo 
thukhal s e 'etho, Deut. XIV, 24. 

2 See also Part III, Chap. VI, § 6, pp. 293^ 



36 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

favorably impressing his judges by his persistent claim 
that he was sent by God to make this prophecy, 
Jeremiah must have convinced them beyond a doubt 
that he really deserved the death-penalty. In fact, 
everything points to the conclusion that the sentence 
passed by the Sarim and the people sitting in judgment 
over Jeremiah must have been: 

" Verily this man deserves the death- penalty, because 
he hath spoken unto us in the name of YHWH our God." 

The only change required in verse 16 to restore what 
according to this conclusion must have been the 
original text is to change the vocalization of 'en (r$) 
to 'in (P^). We would then have here another ex- 
ample of the particle, 'in, which occurs in I Sam. XXI, 
9, and which has baffled ancient and modern exegetes 
alike, but which on closer examination proves to be a 
byform of the emphatic particle, hen, hinne. 1 

It is not difficult to understand how even at an 
early date this rare 'in should have been misread in 
our passage in Jeremiah. As early as the Hellenistic 
period, if not before that time, Jeremiah was prac- 
tically canonized; in fact, all the literary prophets 
were looked upon much as heroes and saints, and a 
radically different view was taken of their activity from 
that which had been held by their contemporaries. 
Accordingly, when the people of those times read 
Jer. XXVI, 1 6, the denial of Jeremiah's guilt lay much 
nearer their thoughts than the affirmation of it, and 
they very naturally read 'en. 

By the reading of 'in for 'en, and by this reading 
alone, do the various discrepancies noted above 
entirely vanish, and vv. 11-23 become a clear and 
connected account of the trial and conviction of Jere- 

1 See Supplementary Note. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 37 

miah. In regard to the defence by some of the elders, it 
may be well to remark that this passus furnishes an 
excellent illustration of one of the most vexing pecul- 
iarities of biblical style, viz., the tendency of the writer 
to disregard rigid sequence and formal transitions. 1 
Thus our author does not consider it necessary to 
mention that the defence by the elders was fruitless; 
he goes on abruptly to relate the coincident and 
similar case of Urijah, and just adds in conclusion that 
Jeremiah escaped execution through the protection 
extended him by Ahikam. Not by any means is 
Chap. XXVI, as Giesebrecht would have it, the slip- 
shod work of an inferior author ; 2 it is a dramatic and 
altogether typical specimen of Oriental narration. 

3. jeremiah's escape — the reading of his 
prophecies by baruch 

Regarding the protection of the prophet by Ahikam, 
one must conclude that the latter managed to spirit 
Jeremiah away to some place where he could remain 
in safe hiding from the people. Had his whereabouts 
been known, he would no doubt have been seized and 
executed like Urijah, who, as vv. 20-23 relate, was 
brought back from Egypt and put to death. 

It would be futile to speculate how Ahikam suc- 
ceeded in spiriting Jeremiah away after he had been 
sentenced to death. History offers examples without 
number of political and religious offenders' escaping 
after having been sentenced to death, and Jeremiah's 

1 See my article, "The Presentation of Biblical Stories to Children/' 
in "The Biblical World," XXV, (1910), 3931., and infra, Chap. IV, 
§4. 

2 See op. cit. prefatory remarks to Chap. XXVT 



38 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

escape after his conviction is hardly more surprising 
than Urijah's flight to Egypt after the King and 
Sarim had given peremptory orders that he be put to 
death on the ground of the precedent established by 
Jeremiah's conviction. 1 

Substantial support of our theory that Jeremiah was 
helped to a place of safety by Ahikam is furnished by 
Chap. XXXVI, which, as stated above, records how 
in the 4th year of Jehojakim's reign Jeremiah had 
Baruch b. Nerijah write down all the prophecies he had 
delivered up to that time, and read them before the 
people assembled from all quarters of the country 
in the Temple at Jerusalem. When the Sarim were 

1 Ahikam's motive in rendering protection to Jeremiah admits of 
only one explanation, viz., that he must have been a personal follower 
of Jeremiah, even as was Baruch b. Nerijah, who risked his life by 
reading Jeremiah's prophecies. There is no basis for Erbt's view that 
Ahikam's protection of the prophet was but an instance of the 
friendly attitude of the family of Shafan toward the prophet (see 
op. cit. 6f., i2f., also 37). The fact that Jeremiah's prophecies were 
read by Baruch from the chamber of Germajah b. Shafan (XXXVI, 
10) is to be considered altogether accidental; it has no more weight 
than the other fact that Micajah, Germajah's son, did not interrupt 
Baruch's reading. Police-permission for and police-supervision of 
public speakers, such as exist in present-day Germany, were unknown 
in those days. As to Micajah, what throws real light on his at- 
titude toward both Baruch and Jeremiah is the fact that he thought 
it his duty to report the occurrence to the Sarim. Thereby he showed 
— as did in their turn the Sarim by their subsequent report to the 
King — that he considered the reading of Jeremiah's prophecies an 
affair calling for action on the part of the authorities. Had he been 
friendly disposed toward Jeremiah he certainly would not have 
reported the matter. Micajah's object in listening to Baruch to the 
end was no doubt the same as that of both the Sarim and the King 
in ordering that the scroll be read to them — he simply wished to as- 
sure himself as to whether the public reading constituted a religious 
offence. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 39 

informed of this occurrence by Micajah, they sum- 
moned Baruch to read the scroll to them, and verse 17 
relates that, as soon as he had finished reading, they 
asked him, "How didst thou come to write down all 
these words?" * Verse 18 gives Baruch's guarded 
answer: "He dictated all these words to me." Now 
the Sarim knew that it was Jeremiah's prophecies 
which Baruch had been reading to them, for apart 
from the fact that the Temple-sermon was among 
them 2 (note v. 2, "And write therein 3 all the words 
that I have spoken unto thee . . . from the day I 
revealed myself unto thee in the days of Josiah even 
unto this day"), there can be no doubt that even as 
in the present Book of Jeremiah, so in the first col- 
lection, several prophecies, notably the consecration 
vision (note particularly verse n) and the opening 
prophecy, Chap. XXV, iff., contained direct evidence 
that they were Jeremiah's words (note verse 3 of 
Chap. XXV, and cf. infra, §4, "Chap. XXV; its 
Origin and Purpose"). If the Sarim had not known 
that Jeremiah was the author, Baruch would neces- 
sarily have mentioned Jeremiah's name in v. 18 in- 
stead of merely referring to him as he. Their ques- 
tion, expressing, as it does, surprise and a certain 
curiosity as to how Baruch came to write down 
Jeremiah's prophecies, is, doubtless, to be explained 
by the fact that Jeremiah's whereabouts were un- 

1 mippiu, not read by the LXX, is clearly dittography of mipplu 
of the following verse. 

2 Although the Sarim were not present when Jeremiah delivered the 
Temple-sermon, there can be no doubt that they were familiar with 
the contents of the sermon from the proceedings at the trial four 
years before. 

3 Read, in accordance with the LXX and also v. 18, 'alalia instead 
of 'elceha. 



40 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

known to them at the time. It will be noticed how 
appropriate under the circumstances was Baruch's 
answer, how little real information it conveyed to his 
questioners: "He dictated all these words to me, and 
I wrote them in the scroll with ink." Lekh hissather 
'attd w e jirm e jahu of v. 19 (usually translated "Go, 
hide thee, thou and Jeremiah!") is in no wise con- 
tradictory to the preceding vv., as it may just as cor- 
rectly be translated, "Go, hide thou with Jeremiah" 
or "even as Jeremiah!" — in fact this is the more 
accurate translation. 1 

Further, the theory that Jeremiah was hidden by 
Ahikam throws light on 'asur (v. 5), which hitherto has 
not been satisfactorily explained. To take ,a ni 'asur 
as meaning "I am prevented by ritualistic unclean- 
liness " is excluded, as Giesebrecht and Cornill rightly 
point out, 2 for as v. 9 shows, there was an interval of 
several months 3 between the time Jeremiah arranged 
with Baruch for the dictation and reading of his 
prophecies and the date when Baruch actually read 
them in the Temple, and Jeremiah could not possibly 
have foreseen several months ahead that he would be 

1 Cf. the similar force of we in Num. XVI, 18, umosoe, Gen. I, 16 
w e, eth hakkokhabhlm, et alit. 

2 Op. ciL, ad loc. 

3 The exegetes have wrongly inferred from v. 9 that a year's time 
must have elapsed between Jeremiah's summoning Baruch and Bar- 
uch's reading Jeremiah's prophecies in the Temple. They have over- 
looked the fact that in reckoning the King's reign the autumnal era is 
followed (in accordance with the usage prevailing throughout pre- 
exilic times and adhered to elsewhere in the Book of Jeremiah), while 
in determining the date of the fast by the month of the year, the 
vernal era is followed, as is evident from the statement in v. 22, 
"the King was sitting in his winter-residence with the burning brazier 
before him." Jeremiah summoned Baruch, no doubt, in the last 
months of the 4th year of Jehojakim's reign. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 41 

prevented by ritualistic uncleanliness from appearing 
in the Temple himself. The phrase, ,a nl 'asur 
(usually translated "I am shut up")? it is safe to 
conclude, simply means "I am in hiding" — a meaning 
which will not seem at all farfetched if one considers 
that when in enforced hiding, one is not less confined 
than when imprisoned, 'asur seems to have this 
meaning also in I Chron. XII, 1, as may be concluded 
from the analogous mistatter of I Sam. XXIII, 19, 
XXVI, 1, as well as from the rendering of the LXX, 
<Jvveyo\LevQV. 

In the light of these probable facts, Jehojakim's 
action on hearing the recital of Jeremiah's prophecies 
by Baruch falls into its proper perspective. It has 
been explained as the arbitrary act of an autocratic 
ruler, but as a matter of fact, the King could not well 
have acted otherwise. The death-sentence would long 
since have been executed against Jeremiah had his 
hiding-place been known, and now that there seemed 
a possible clue to his whereabouts, the King was bound 
to order that he be captured and put to death forth- 
with. That Baruch was included in this order is 
easily explained, for, inasmuch as the Temple-sermon 
was among the prophecies read by him, he had clearly 
incriminated himself , and, like Urijah, had laid himself 
open to summary punishment. 

The King's burning of the scroll was likewise a 
perfectly logical procedure. Jehojakim simply wished, 
in accordance with the spirit of the law, Deut. XVIII, 
15-22, to destroy all trace of Jeremiah's prophecies. 
To reason with Duhm, 1 who concludes from v. 16 
that the Sarim were impressed by the reading of 

1 Op. cit., ad loc. 



42 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Jeremiah's prophecies, 1 and that the King meant to 
show that he could not be thus impressed, is to view 
those remote ages through the spectacles of modern 
times. As a matter of fact there is in this chapter no 
real support for the theory that the Sarim were im- 
pressed by Jeremiah's prophecies. For since verse 24 
expressly states, "But the King and his officials who 
heard all these words feared not, neither did they tear 
their garments," it follows either that palfdu 'i§ 'ael 
reeu of v. 16 must mean, "they turned to one another 
amazed," or "horrified", 2 not, as usually translated, 
"they turned to one another in fear" (one can easily 
believe that the Sarim were indeed shocked by the 
temerity of Jeremiah and Baruch), 3 or that in accord- 
ance with avvefiovXevaavTo of the LXX the text 
originally read no a su, "they consulted together," 
instead of pahdu. Verse 25, "Elnathan, Delajah, 
and Gemarjah even urged the King not to burn the 
scroll, but he did not listen unto them," cannot be 
cited in proof that Jeremiah's prophecies made an 
impression on the Sarim — or at least on some of 
them — for the indications are that the Masoretic text 
is not correct. The LXX read just the opposite: 
Kal ~E\va6av . . . vireOevTO tw fiaatXei 77-^00? to fcara- 
Kavacu to yapriov, "Elnathan . . . urged the King to 
burn the scroll." Note that not only is the negative 
lacking in the reading of the LXX, but also the follow- 
ing clause, ' ' but he did not listen to them." This read- 

1 Duhm not only draws this conclusion from v. 16, but he arbitrarily 
emends v. 18 to accord with it. 

2 Cf. Gen. XLII, 28, wajjaehaerdu 'is 'ael 'ahiu, " and startled they 
turned to one another." 

8 This is approximately also Giesebrecht's interpretation; see op. 
tit., ad loc. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 43 

ing of the LXX is clearly the only reading that is con- 
sistent with the preceding verse 24: " But neither the 
King nor his servants * that heard all these words 
showed fear, or rent their garments." It is safe to con- 
clude, therefore, that the original text of v. 25 did not 
read l e bhilti s e roph, "not to burn," but lisroph, "to 
burn," and thsLtw e lo sama 1 ,a lehaem was not added until 
after biltl had crept in. This conclusion is further con- 
firmed by the gam, "even." In urging the King to 
burn the scroll, Elnathan, Delajah, and Gemarjah 
were impelled by the same motive as the King was 
in burning it, i. e., by the desire to have all trace of the 
sacrilegious work destroyed. This would leave no 
ground for the assumption that the Sarim took the 
part of Jeremiah and Baruch: for the only remaining 
passage on which such an inference could be based is 
v. 19, and this verse might just as easily have the 
opposite meaning from that which it is supposed to 
have. The Sarini's rejoinder on Baruch's clever 
refusal to betray Jeremiah's whereabouts may well 
have been, and very probably was, not a piece of 
sincere advice, but an ironical retort — "Go, hide thou 
with Jeremiah, and let no one know where ye are." 2 
Regarding the persecution which Jeremiah met 
with from the nation at large, it is clear from the 
foregoing analysis that Jehojakim's alleged hostile 
attitude was no factor in it. Contrary to the prevail- 
ing opinion, it was not Jehojakim's example that fired 

1 1 advisedly follow the reading of the LXX, which omits kol of 
kol ia badau, "any of his servants;" whether one reads kol or not is 
immaterial, since it is here, as frequently elsewhere, pleonastic. 

2 It is hardly necessary to mention that there is no justification 
for either CornilPs translation, "niemand darf wissen," or Giese- 
brecht's, "niemand wisse." 



44 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

the people to hostility toward the prophet when his 
prophecies were read by Baruch in the Temple. Their 
persecution of Jeremiah started with his Temple- 
sermon— in fact was the direct result of it. The Temple- 
sermon it was which formed the decisive event in the 
prophet's career. It marked the parting of the ways. 
In it Jeremiah mercilessly attacked what the people 
felt to be their holiest beliefs and institutions, and 
mocked at the hollowness of their worship. They, on 
their side, were convinced that he was a dangerous 
man, a false prophet, according to the Deuteronomic 
standard (Deut. XVIII, 15-22), and from that moment 
every man's hand was against him. From that time 
on he was forced to remain in hiding with the death- 
sentence hanging over his head. Only with the death 
of Jehojakim and the accession of a new king was this 
sentence, we must assume, abrogated, and only then 
did it become safe for the prophet to appear in public 
again. 

Cornill's idea that Jeremiah preached publicly 
during the second part of Jehojakim's reign cannot be 
substantiated; he bases his view on Chap. XV, 10, 
15-21 and on Chap. XXXV. 1 In regard to the former 
I am of Cornill's opinion, that it dates from the time 
of Jehojakim, but from the first part of Jehojakim's 
reign instead of the second, i. e., from the time be- 
tween Jeremiah's condemnation to death and the 
reading of his prophecies by Baruch. (Cornill, who, 
with the rest of the biblical scholars, thinks that 
Jeremiah's persecution started with the latter event, 
necessarily places the confession after this occurrence.) 
The piece clearly reflects the fanatical persecution 

1 See op. tit., Chap. XXXVI, 26, Chap. XV, 21, and Chap. XXXV, 
and Einleitung, pp. XXXf., XLf. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 45 

which Jeremiah had to endure from the whole nation 
in consequence of his Temple-sermon, preached in the 
first year of Jehojakim's reign. The point is, however, 
that it is not a sermon that was delivered publicly, 
but is a confession never intended for public delivery — 
a passionate outburst of the prophet's soul to God, 
a bitter review of his suffering and isolation, conclud- 
ing with a burst of faith and exultant confidence in 
God's aid. There is nothing in this confession to 
indicate Jeremiah's public activity at that time, 
nothing to justify CornilPs remark: a The speaker is a 
man who works with the fullest publicity, and who 
moves about freely in the world. He stands in the 
very midst of life, whose current at the moment 
threatens to engulf him." 

In regard to Chap. XXXV, it must be remembered 
that the date given in the heading, v. 1, cannot be 
accepted, for v. 11 states expressly that the flight of 
the Rechabites to Jerusalem, shortly after which 
Jeremiah delivered this prophecy, took place at the 
time of Nebuchadrezzar's approach to the country. 
Nebuchadrezzar's first appearance in the country, 
however, did not happen until after the death of 
Jehojakim, 1 hence the earliest date of the prophecy 
would be the reign of Jehojachin. 

1 The recognition of Nebuchadrezzar's suzerainty by Jehojakim, 
mentioned II Ki. XXIV, 1, was not the result of a military expedition 
by Nebuchadrezzar into Judah, but of his decisive victory over Pharao 
Necho at Karkemish and his consequent control over Syria. II Ki. 
XXIV, 1 is fragmentary, the original text having no doubt contained 
a statement about Pharao Necho's defeat (note v. 7) ; see Benzinger, 
"Die Bucher der Konige" (in Marti's HC), ad loc. and also "Die 
Bucher der Chronik" ib. on II Chron. XXXVI, 5-8. 



46 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 



4. CHAPTER XXV — ITS ORIGIN AND PURPOSE 

Chapter XXV cannot be taken as a proof that 
Jeremiah had appeared in public earlier in the year in 
which he dictated his prophecies to Baruch. Verse 3, 
as Rothstein points out (in Kautzsch 3 , prefatory 
remarks to Chap. XXV), shows that this chapter has 
some connection with the record in Chap. XXXVI 
about the reading of Jeremiah's prophecies by Baruch. 
On the ground of this, Rothstein rightly concludes 
that XXV, 3-130^ in their original form were written 
by Jeremiah for the distinct purpose of serving as an 
introduction to the reading of his prophecies by Ba- 
ruch. He points out further that only by such an 
assumption is light thrown on the words, "all that is 
written in this book," i3ba, with which the first part 
of XXV, originally closed 1 — the book referred to 

1 The last clause of v. 13, "... which Jeremiah prophesied 
against the nations," is not a part of the original text of XXV, 1-13, 
but, as the LXX shows, it originally formed the heading of the non- 
Jeremianic oracles against the nations, Chaps. XLVI-LI, which at 
one time must have stood in the Masoretic text, as they still do in the 
LXX, between XXV, 1-13 and isff. This is not the place for a de- 
tailed discussion of the authorship of Jer. XLVI-LI — such a discus- 
sion must be reserved for the second volume. In view of the fact, 
however, that Cornill and others claim the oracles of Chaps. XLVI- 
XLDC for Jeremiah, and that Cornill holds in addition that these were 
delivered by Jeremiah in 605, shortly before he committed his proph- 
ecies to writing (op. cit., Einleitung, p. XXXI), it must be pointed out 
that apart from everything else, these oracles, all with the exception 
of the one against the Philistines, differ in spirit as well as in charac- 
ter and object so radically from the prohecies of Jeremiah that they 
cannot possibly be considered his work. It may be well to add that 
they differ no less strikingly from the prophecies of Jeremiah's 
kindred predecessors, including even those prophecies of Amos and 
Isaiah which predict judgment against other nations. To take by 
way of illustration the opening piece, XLVI, 2-12, the first of the 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 47 

being none other than the one spoken of in Chap. 
XXXVI. Rothstein points out finally that XXV, 15ft". 
in their original form, i. e., vv. 15a, 27, 30ft*., formed 
a fitting conclusion to this book of prophecies which 
Baruch read in the Temple. The contents of the book, 
i. e., the impending judgment which the prophet has 
been predicting so many years, is figuratively spoken 
of in vv. 15, 27 as the cup of divine wrath which God 
has bidden him hand around, while vv. 30$. describe 
the storm breaking over the country from the north 
and carrying destruction in its wake. 

Rothstein' s view is most convincing, for one can 
hardly imagine that Jeremiah would have Baruch 
read to the people his prophecies of the past without 
dwelling on the circumstances that prompted him 
to this step, and without pointing out how present 
events vindicate his claim that he has all these years 
been inspired by God. 1 It was in fact this considera- 
tion that led me, independent of Rothstein, to prac- 
tically the same conclusions regarding the origin and 
purpose of Chap. XXV, as also regarding the original 
form of vv. 15!!. 

On the question of the original form of vv. 1-14, 
Rothstein advances no new theory. Biblical scholars 
are agreed that what the Masoretic text contains in 
excess of the LXX is the work of an interpolate^ 
and besides, that, even as read by the LXX, v. 12 is 

two utterances against Egypt, it will be noticed that this piece is not 
a prophecy at all, but a chauvinistic song of derision over the defeat 
of Pharao Necho at Karkemish. It shows no true religious feeling 
whatever. Jeremiah could never have produced anything of the 
kind; to him, who realized the seriousness of the situation after the 
battle at Karkemish, such blind rejoicing over Egypt's defeat would 
have seemed sheer mockery. 

1 See also Part III, Chap. I, p. 17 2f. and Chap. Ill, § 4, b, p. 207. 



48 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

not original text. The only point on which opinion 
is divided is whether to eliminate as interpolation also 
"and against all the nations roundabout" of v. 9. 
Rothstein rightly points out in favor of its elimination 
that, according to vv. 36°., 11, 13a, ha as well as v. 2, 
Jeremiah clearly addresses himself to Judah alone, 
and also that, according to all indications, the book of 
prophecies read by Baruch contained predictions of 
judgment against Judah only. 

In regard to the original form of i5ff., I agree fully 
with Rothstein except on one point. I do not consider 
the whole of v. 15b spurious, but only "all the 
nations to which I shall send thee." I find that 
Aquila's reading of 15b, Kal iroTieZs avrovs, sub- 
stantiates Rothstein's view that the whole passus 
which pertains to the nations is interpolated. It 
points to w e hi§qithd 'otham ("and cause them to drink 
it") as original text 1 instead of w e hisqUhd 'otha ("and 
cause ... to drink it "), and 'otham ("them") leaves 
no room for "all the nations to which I shall send 
thee." This clause must be a later addition, and, this 
being the case, it is obvious that vv. 17-26 cannot 
have been in the original text either. Further, God's 
command to Jeremiah in v. 27, "And tell them, thus 
saith the Lord Sabaoth, drink to intoxication and 
vomit and fall and rise no more because of the sword 
which I am to send among you," would have no sense 
after w. 17ft., which state that Jeremiah took the cup 
from God's hand and handed it round to the nations, 
one by one. 

Verse 16, as Rothstein rightly points out, betrays 
itself at a glance as the prosaic equivalent of v. 27, 

1 Th2 object kds is to be construed with both the preceding verb, 
ga/f, and the following verb, htiqithti,. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 49 

and can have originated only with the interpolater. 
Verses 28, 29, the prosaic quality of which is equally 
conspicuous, belong in the same category as 15b ft, 
17-26. By placing vv. 27, 3 off. immediately after 
"and cause them to drink it" of v. 15, we get a highly 
poetic text throughout the original second part of 
Chap. XXV. It is not only poetic but admirably 
suited to the purpose which it was meant to serve, 
that of closing the reading of Jeremiah's prophecies 
with a stirring picture of the destruction so swiftly 
approaching from Babylon. 1 

NOTE ON THE DATE OE JER. XVII, 1 9-2 7 

See Geiger, "Urschrift und Ubersetzung," pp. 95f.; 
Kuenen, " Historisch-Kritische Einleitung i. d. Bucher 
des Alten Testaments," II, i67fL; and Cornill, op. 
ciL, ad loc. 

Apart from the striking similarity in spirit and 
subject-matter between Jer. XVII, 19-27 and Neh. 

1 In the description of the coming ruin of vv. 3 off., I find evidence of 
the work of the interpolator only in baggojim of v. 31, which was 
probably substituted for baggojo or b eC ammo (similarly the Masoretic 
text, Is. Ill, 13, reads 'ammim for original ''ammo). In v. $ojos e bhe 
ha'araes (in accordance with the parallelism and LXX omit kol and 
read l al for 'ael) means "the inhabitants of the land," as follows from 
'al nawehu of the parallel member, and accordingly l ad q e se ha'araes 
of the immediately following v. 31 means "throughout the land" and 
miqsl ha'araes w ei ad q e se ha'araes of v. 2>Z "from one end of the land 
to the other" (cf. XII, 12), and finally kol basar of v. 31 connotes, as 
ib., XLV, 5, and Jo. Ill, 1, "all people" and not "all mankind." 
As in XXXI, 8, the countries of the Assyrian-Babylonian realm are 
meant by mijjarkHhe 'araes of v. 32; in Is. V, 26, XLI, 9 the terms 
q e se, q e soth, and 'aslle "limits" or "borders" (which is the meaning 
also oijarkHhe), occur instead; these expressions find their explanation 
in the fact that for the writers of those times the Assyrian-Babylonian 
realm formed the geographical horizon to the east. 



50 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

XIII, 15-22, in which these scholars have rightly seen 
proof that the former is a product of the time of Ezra 
and Nehemiah, there are certain points which indicate 
an actual dependence of Jer. XVII, 19-27 on Neh. 
XIII, 15-22. It has remained unnoticed, except by 
Siegfried, that in both these pieces massa has not the 
meaning "burden," but the meaning "merchandise." 1 
This follows clearly in the case of Neh. XIII, 15 and 
19 from the fact that in v. 15 kol massa is used as 
a general term to include all the articles of mer- 
chandise that have just been enumerated, and from 
the further fact that the injunction, "no merchan- 
dise (massa) shall come in on the Sabbath-day," in 
v. 19 is followed up in v. 20 by the statement, "Then 
the traders and the dealers in all sorts of merchandise 
{kol mimkar) passed the night outside of Jerusalem 
once or twice." Neh. XIII, 15, i9f. throw light on 
the meaning of the word massa in Jer. XVII, 2 if. and 
27, regarding which we would otherwise be in the 
dark. That unlike the author of Neh. XIII, 15-22, the 
author of Jer. XVII, 19-27 did not make it clear that 
he used massa with this specific meaning may be 
explained only in either of the following ways — that 
his address followed close on Nehemiah' s ordinance, in 
which case he might safely assume that his audience 
would understand the use of the word massa, or that 
he mechanically drew on Neh. XIII, 15-22 as his 
source. Neh. XIII, 15-22 throws light on another 
obscure point of Jer. XVII, 19-27, viz., ubho b e H ia re 
frusalaim b e jom hassabbath of v. 27. Verse 19 of 
the former, "And I placed some of my servants at 
the gates, so that no merchandise should come in on 

x See "Ezra, Nehemia und Esther" (in Nowack's HK.) on Neh. 
XIII, 15 and 19. 



THE TEMPLE-SERMON 51 

the Sabbath day" (<Q a saery Id jabho massd b e jom 
hassabbath), shows that massd immediately preceding 
ubho b e sa ia re frusalaim in Jer. XVII, 27, besides being 
object of the infinitive, s e 'eth } is to be construed also 
with bho as subject (for examples of similar and con- 
verse construction cf. Exod. XXXII, 24, Vml zahabh 
hithparaqu; I Ki. V, 1, Is. XL VI, i3aa, Prov. Ill, 21, et 
alit). As in Neh. XIII, 19 so in Jer. XVII, 27 the ref- 
erence is to the importation of merchandise into Jeru- 
salem by foreign merchants, and the author of Jer. 
XVII, 19-27, in speaking or writing uFbhilti s e, ethmassd 
ubho b e sa ia re frusalaim b e jdm hassabbath, "and not to 
transport merchandise or to have it come in through 
the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath-day," evidently 
had in mind the situation as described in Neh. XIII, 
15-22, and took it for granted that this situation was 
familiar to his audience or readers. In view of these 
two facts which clearly point to a close dependence of 
Jer. XVII, 19-27 on Neh. XIII, 15-22, it is absolutely 
impossible to defend with Rothstein (in Kautzsch, 3 
ad loc.) Jeremiah's authorship of XVII, 19-27. On 
the other hand, in Jer. XVII, 19-27, as elsewhere, the 
Sabbath-observance consists in not carrying on busi- 
ness and not performing labor; Duhm's remarks 
(op. cit.) on w. 21 and 27 are without basis. 



CHAPTER III 

THE PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH UNDER 
ZEDEKIAH. CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF CHAP- 
TERS XXXVII, XXXVIII, XXXIV, XXXII 3b-5, 
XXI 

A. THE ACTUAL FACTS OF THE CASE 

After the death of Jehojakim, Jeremiah was again 
free to appear in public, and he seems to have enjoyed 
a brief respite from persecution. However, toward 
the close of Zedekiah's reign, during the siege of 
Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans, he stirred up the wrath 
of his countrymen anew by his insistent prophesying 
of doom ; and from that time on he was denounced and 
persecuted more vigorously than ever; on two occa- 
sions his life was in imminent danger. 

The first of these occasions was during the early 
stage of the siege of Jerusalem, when the siege was 
raised for a short time because of the arrival of an 
Egyptian army to relieve the city. While, presum- 
ably, the general rejoicing over their supposed deliver- 
ance was at its height, Jeremiah appeared in the peo- 
ple's midst, and scoring them for their breach of faith, 
pronounced their victory a mockery. The particular 
action which had so outraged the prophet's sense of 
justice was their conduct in regard to the serfs. These 
by proclamation of Zedekiah had been set free shortly 
after the siege had begun, in order, no doubt, that 
they might be made use of in fighting the enemy. 
In accordance with the custom of the time, their lib- 

52 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 53 

eration had even been ratified by a solemn religious 
act, but no sooner had the siege been raised than the 
serfs were again enslaved. Jeremiah considered this 
nothing short of arrant treachery, and to the govern- 
ment and the people who were responsible for it, he 
predicted utter, inevitable ruin, and this in spite of 
their present triumph in driving back the Chaldaeans. 
He closed his prediction: "Even should ye destroy 
the whole army of the Chaldasans fighting against 
you until only the massacred be left, these will rise in 
their tents, man by man, and burn down the city" 
(XXXIV, 8-22, XXXVII, 7b-io). 

In the eyes of the Sarim, no doubt, this attack was 
both seditious and inflammatory, so that when, shortly 
after, Jeremiah was about to leave Jerusalem for his 
home-village, Anathoth (for what purpose is not clear, 
owing to the obscurity of the phrase, lalflaq misam 
bHhokh ha 1 am of XXXVII, 12), he was summarily 
seized on the pretext that he meant to desert to the 
Chaldaeans, and without the semblance of a trial was 
flogged and thrown into a dungeon. Here he was held 
"for a long time," and here he would probably have 
died if the King, acceding to his request, had not 
finally changed the sentence to imprisonment in the 
court of guard (XXXVII, n-21). 

As prisoner in the court of guard, Jeremiah enjoyed 
a certain amount of freedom in that he was allowed 
to hold intercourse with other people, but by this very 
liberty he soon imperilled his life anew. The Chal- 
daeans had again laid siege to Jerusalem (it was be- 
cause of this that he had been summoned by Zedekiah 
from the dungeon for a secret interview *)> and he 

1 There is no doubt that the Chaldaeans had renewed the siege of 
Jerusalem at the time Zedekiah summoned Jeremiah from the 



54 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

felt prompted to a new utterance. In spite of all his 
experiences in the past, he could not keep silent. He 
declared that the nation was irrevocably doomed, and 
drastically told the people engaged in righting the 
enemy that their attempt to defend the capital was 
hopeless, that the city must fall into the hands of the 
Chaldaeans and every soul therein perish, whether 
by the sword, by famine, or by pestilence; only those 
who should desert to the Chaldaeans might escape. 

The Sarim, some of whom heard these words, saw 
in them an act of treason, and after receiving carte 
blanche from Zedekiah, they decided to get rid of him 
for good by throwing him into a miry cistern in the 
fortress. In this extreme case he would certainly have 
perished in a short time ! but for the Ethiopian eunuch, 
Ebed-Melech, who obtained permission of Zedekiah to 
go to his rescue, and who with difficulty had him 
extracted from the cistern. Jeremiah was thus saved 

dungeon, for otherwise Jeremiah could not have asked, "Where are 
now your prophets who prophesied unto you, 'The King of Babylon 
shall not descend upon this city'?" (XXXVII, 19). 

1 In XXXVIII, 9 not only kl 'en hallaehaem 'dd bair but also mip- 
p e ne haraabh is undoubtedly an interpolation, for Zedekiah's words 
to Ebed-Melech, "get Jeremiah out of the cistern before he dies" 
(v. 10), show that Jeremiah was in imminent peril. Had the danger 
been that, in the distribution of the daily rations to the hungry 
masses, Jeremiah down in the pit might be overlooked and might 
starve to death, there would have been no need for instantaneous 
action. The great necessity for haste admits of but one explanation, 
viz., that the danger facing Jeremiah was that he might sink beyond 
recovery in the miry bottom of the cistern. This is further borne out 
by the description of his rescue. Evidently it was hard work to get 
him out — no doubt because of the suction of the mire — and it was 
necessary to take precautions to prevent the strain of the pulling from 
injuring him. wajjamoth tahtdu "that he might die right there," is 
perfect text, the apocopate consecutive expressing here the avowed 
intention of the Sarim in throwing Jeremiah into the cistern. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 55 

from what had seemed certain death, but he was not 
set at liberty. He remained imprisoned in the court 
of guard until the fall of Jerusalem (XXXIV, 1-3, 
XXXII, 3 b-5, XXI, 4-14, XXXVIII, 1-13, 28a). 

B. CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE PROPHECIES AND 
BIOGRAPHICAL RECORDS OF THE PERIOD 

The above presentation of events is based on a 
critical analysis of the biographical chapters XXXVII 
and XXXVIII and of the pieces correlated with these, 
viz., XXXIV, 8-22 with XXXVII, and XXXIV, 1-7, 
XXXII, 30-5, XXI, 1-14 with XXXVIII. Inasmuch 
as in these two groups authentic records have become 
interfused with legendary tales, the analysis which 
follows will necessarily aim to sift out the legendary 
from the authentic in addition to establishing the 
correlation between the various parts. 

1. xxxvn, 17-21 and xxxviii, 14-27 

Each piece relates a secret interview of Zedekiah 
with Jeremiah. Both accounts have hitherto been 
considered authentic, and accordingly, it has always 
been taken for granted that Zedekiah twice sum- 
moned Jeremiah for a secret interview, the first time, 
while Jeremiah was imprisoned in the dungeon of 
Jonathan's house, and the second, after his rescue 
from the miry cistern. This point has never been 
questioned, but a critical examination shows beyond 
a doubt that the account, XXXVIII, 14-27, is but 
another version of the interview related in XXXVII, 
17-21. 

The key to the situation is found in Zedekiah's 
suggestion to Jeremiah in XXXVIII, 26 that, if 
interrogated about the interview by the Sarim, 



56 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

he should answer: "I presented to the King my 
petition that he would not send me back to the 
house of Jonathan to die there." Now during his 
interview with Zedekiah while imprisoned in the 
dungeon of Jonathan's house, Jeremiah actually did 
present such a request to Zedekiah, and in practically 
those identical words (cf. XXXVII, 20); while, after 
his rescue from the miry cistern, he did not make 
such a request, nor is there anywhere the slightest 
reference to a design on the part of the Sarim or the 
King to return him to the dungeon of Jonathan's 
house, or for that matter to any other dungeon. 
Which of the two accounts, however, is the authentic 
record and which the legendary product of a later 
age, is not difficult to decide. 

(A) XXXVIII, 14-27 — THE LEGENDARY ACCOUNT 

Both from a psychological and from a historical 
point of view the account, XXXVIII, 14-27, is ficti- 
tious. Note in the former regard how Zedekiah urges 
Jeremiah not to withhold anything from him (v. 14) — 
as if it were Jeremiah's habit to refrain from speaking 
his mind. Note further how Jeremiah shrinks from 
answering Zedekiah for fear that Zedekiah may kill 
him if he replies. In fact he does not speak until after 
Zedekiah has assured him under oath that he will 
neither kill him himself, nor deliver him into the 
hands of those men who seek his life (vv. i5f.)- The 
real Jeremiah knew no such fear; he had absolutely 
no regard for the consequences of his words. In fact 
he was only too ready to declare his mind on all 
occasions, and without doubt he would have told the 
truth bluntly to the Sarim had he been questioned by 
them. However, the picture of the Sarim, consumed 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 57 

with curiosity regarding their interview, which we 
receive from the King's admonition to Jeremiah, and 
more especially the feature that the King foresees this 
curiosity and forewarns Jeremiah, bear the unmis- 
takable stamp of the legendary. It is safe to assert 
that Jeremiah's supposed mendacity, which has called 
forth such ingenious apology from modern exegetes, 
belongs altogether in the realm of the mythical. 

Logically considered, the Sariyrfs curiosity regarding 
what Jeremiah secretly said to the King is absurd, in 
view of the contemptuous attitude of the people in 
general toward Jeremiah. He was looked upon as a 
nuisance, and his prophecies held to be the utterances 
of a madman (cf. XXIX, 26), even as those of the 
other literary prophets had been considered in their 
day. The only point that concerned the authorities 
was how to get rid of him, or at least how to make him 
quit his troublesome prophesying of evil. 

Another point which indicates the legendary char- 
acter of the story is the circumstance that the Sarim 
learn at once of the interview, regardless of the fact 
that it is supposed to be a secret one. Such contradic- 
tions may almost invariably be detected in legendary 
records. They are doubtless to be explained by a de- 
sire on the part of the author to make the story more 
thrilling than the plain statement of facts seems to 
him. His imagination readily supplies the necessary 
embellishment, but in seeking to improve on his origi- 
nal, he is prone to overlook some detail which makes 
his addition most unlikely, if not altogether impossi- 
ble. In the present case our author betrays a lack of 
appreciation for the most vital quality of his original. 
He has not caught the true spirit of it. He does not 
see that the effectiveness, the almost crushing force of 



58 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

the original narrative lies in its very simplicity and 
directness (see infra, p. 63). 

How complete his lack of insight is for the situa- 
tion he attempts to describe, is shown by the couplet, 
v. 22b, the greeting with which Jeremiah tells Zedekiah 
he will be hailed by the captive women of his harem, 
when himself led captive to the camp of the Chaldaeans. 
This couplet has of late been taken as a dirge. In tone 
it is, however, clearly derisive, although written, like 
Is. XIV, 4ff., and XXXVII, «ff., in the meter of 
the Kinastrophe, and Giesebrecht is right in defending 
the old interpretation of it as a song of derision. 1 

Is it credible that Jeremiah, whose sensitive soul 
suffered agonies at every thought of his people's doom, 
could have conceived such an unnatural and revolting 
scene as is this picture of the women of the King's 
harem coming forth to jeer at the degradation of their 
lord and King, — those women who had themselves been 
taken as spoils of war into the camp of the enemy and 
subjected to the humiliation and dishonor invariable 
under those circumstances. A picture, so psycholog- 
ically untrue, could not have suggested itself to Jere- 
miah. He would have known instinctively that in 
that hour of misery and despair those women, however 
frivolous, would not be in the mood for derision. Had 
he chosen to harrow the mind of the King with a picture 
of his women on that day, he would most certainly 
have painted the grim reality, as Amos in his prophecy 
to Amaziah, — " Thy wife will be ravished in the city." 2 

1 See op. cit., ad loc. — Erbt's remark (in op. cit, p. 57) with reference 
to the couplet that to the King the lamentation "is bitter derision" 
is an involuntary acknowledgment that the old interpretation is the 
correct one. 

2 The attitude at present prevailing among exegetes toward certain 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 59 

The climax of absurdity, however, is reached in 
Jeremiah's advice to Zedekiah in w. 17J:., 20 and in 
Zedekiah's reply, v. 19. Taken by itself, v. 17 would 
probably call for no comment; it would be taken as 
meaning that Jeremiah actually advised Zedekiah to 
seek his own safety as well as the welfare of the city by 
surrendering to the Chaldaeans; but Zedekiah's strange 
reply alters the complexion of the whole passage: 
"I am afraid of the Judasans who have deserted 
to the Chaldaeans, lest they (i. e., the Chaldaeans) 
deliver me into their hands to be reviled by them." 

Judging from this reply, one would have to conclude 
that Zedekiah understood either of two things : either 
that Jeremiah meant him to steal off to the camp of the 
Chaldaeans and give himself up like any deserter, or 
that he was advising him to offer to the Chaldaeans 
that the city be surrendered to them, in which case, 
Zedekiah reflected, the Chaldaeans would make it a 
condition that he, as head of the rebellious forces, be 
delivered over to them. 

In either case, however, the situation would be 
absurd. In the first case, Zedekiah would have treated 
Jeremiah's suggestion with the scorn it deserved, in- 
stead of simply demurring with such a ridiculous 
reason. No king, however great a weakling, would 
entertain the idea of entering the camp of the enemy 
as a deserter. And in the second case, Zedekiah would 

obvious discrepancies in the biographic parts of Jeremiah is hardly 
compatible with exact methods of criticism. As a rule these dis- 
crepancies are disposed of lightly with the remark, "this but shows 
that the passage in question is the work of Baruch." But even were 
it certain that the biographic portions are the exclusive work of Ba- 
ruch, it would be but reasonable to suppose that Baruch knew what 
he was talking about, and also that he wrote either from personal 
knowledge or from information received from Jeremiah himself. 



60 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

have known only too well, that if the Chaldaeans 
insisted upon the surrender of his own person, it 
would not be to turn him over to the taunts of his com- 
patriots, but to cast him into fetters and lead him in 
triumph to their own country, as was done ten years 
previously with Jehojachin. It would have been to 
these indignities that Zedekiah's mind would have 
reverted, and he would undoubtedly have told Jere- 
miah that he would fight to the last ditch, and if 
necessary, kill himself by his own sword or hurl him- 
self into the burning ruins of his palace, rather than 
deliver himself voluntarily to such a fate. 

For Jeremiah's advice to Zedekiah, the author of the 
story, XXXVIII, 14-27, drew from the prophecy 
XXXIV, 1-3 (XXXII, 3 b-5), XXI, 4-14, which was 
delivered by Jeremiah while prisoner in the court of 
guard. 1 His method of using his source illustrates a 
very interesting point, a point which is generally to 
be noticed in legendary records, viz., that the author 
betrays his lack of historical understanding most 
conspicuously when he deviates, for deviating from 
his source simply means that he has read his own 
subjective interpretation into it. 

Thus Jeremiah, in the prophecy just mentioned, 
nowhere advises Zedekiah to surrender. Instead, he 
emphatically asserts that the city is doomed beyond 
recall, and even so Zedekiah's fate decided — he will be 
taken as captive to Babylon. No righting against 
the enemy can avail, since Yhwh Himself is in arms 
against them. Only if they heeded God's word, he 
declares, addressing himself to the royal house, might 
they be saved (XXI, n), that is, as XXI, 12 defines, 

1 Cf. infra, § 2, where it will also be shown that XXXIV, 41. are an 
interpolation. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 61 

if they conformed to God's will by the establishment 
of a just government. 

Two things are at once clear from this prophecy, 
that Jeremiah did not cherish the remotest hope that 
the nation's doom might be averted, and that con- 
sequently, in this particular instance as throughout 
his preaching, he did not mean to give practical ad- 
vice, 1 did not even expect that his words would be of 
any practical consequence for the immediate course of 
events. The latter point is made quite clear by the 
fact that he follows up his exhortation to the royal 
house to introduce righteous government with the 
renewed assertion that the city is doomed (XXI, i3f.). 
Neither Jeremiah nor his predecessor prophets, it may 
be stated here, were concerned with the politics of the 

1 Chap. XXVII cannot be cited in proof that Jeremiah at one time 
did really advise Zedekiah to save the nation by submitting to the 
suzerainty of Babylon, for this chapter, it is generally agreed because 
of the contradictions in the text, has not come down to us in its original 
form but greatly interpolated. The late date of some of the interpola- 
tions is shown by the fact that the text as read by the LXX was as 
yet free from them. It is not possible to reconstruct the prophecy as 
Jeremiah delivered it. It was meant, we know, to explain his symbolic 
action of wearing the yoke at the time deputies from other Palestinian 
countries were counseling rebellion against Babylon. And so much is 
certain, XhaXwilfju " and live," at the end of v. 12 with the following 
v. 13 and also v. 17 did not form a part of the original prophecy. 
These verses would indicate that Jeremiah advised a willing submis- 
sion to Babylon in order to prevent the nation's doom, but such ad- 
vice would be in direct contradiction to Jeremiah's declaration, w.16, 
i8ff., that the vessels of the Temple which were carried to Babylon 
with Jehojachin will not be brought back, as their prophets prophesy 
to the people, but rather that the remaining vessels which were not 
taken at that time, will also be taken to Babylon. Further the verses 
under discussion are not contained in the LXX, which under the cir- 
cumstances is a clear indication that they were added at a very late 
time. 



62 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

day; they had no intention whatever of influencing 
the course of public events. 1 

But the author of the story, XXXVIII, 14-27, was 
far from seeing Jeremiah and his preaching in this 
light. To him Jeremiah was the leader and adviser of 
his age, another Samuel or Elijah — a conception of 
the literary prophets which prevails in many quarters 
up to our own day. He saw in Jeremiah's utterance, 
XXXIV, 1-3 (XXXII, 3D-5), XXI, 4-14, no purpose 
other than that of advising Zedekiah to save the city 
by surrendering to the Chaldaeans; and in drawing on 
this utterance for his own story of the interview he 
naturally gave it this interpretation. Jeremiah's real 
advice to Zedekiah escaped him. He was, doubtless, 
confirmed in his conclusions by XXI, 8-10, where 
Jeremiah, addressing himself to the people, tells them 
to cease their hopeless fighting and join the ranks of the 
Chaldaeans — the bitter irony of these words he nat- 
urally failed to notice (see infra). 

(b) XXXVII, 17-21 — THE AUTHENTIC RECORD 

To turn now to the account of the secret interview 
between Zedekiah and Jeremiah, which is given 
XXXVII, 17-21, it will be seen at once how this 
account accords with Jeremiah's utterance, XXXIV, 
1-3 (XXXII, 3b-5), XXI, 4-14, in that there is no 
mention of surrender, nothing that could even re- 
motely suggest such an idea. The scene is most 
realistic, and especially is the picture presented of the 
prophet a life-like one, corresponding in every way 
to his real character as revealed in the various authen- 
tic situations throughout the book. 

1 These points will occupy our attention more fully in the chaps. 
" The Prophets believe the doom inevitable." 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 63 

As to the role played by Zedekiah, history offers 
numerous examples of kings, who, under similar 
circumstances, acted in precisely the same way. 
Prompted, no doubt, by the desperation of the mo- 
ment, rather than by any high regard for the prophet's 
authority, Zedekiah secretly summons Jeremiah, and 
without any preamble puts the question that is 
weighing on his soul, jes dabhar m e, eth jahwce, "Is 
there a word from Yhwh? " With crushing directness 
comes the prophet's answer : jes * b e jad maelaekh 
babhael tinnathen, "There is ! Thou shalt be given into 
the hand of the King of Babylon." 

The anxious question of the King reveals the 
seriousness of the situation. The return of the Chal- 
daeans has filled him with uneasiness and tragic fore- 
bodings, yet his heart is clamoring for hope, for a 
word of encouragement. His official prophets stand 
ready to reassure him, but their promises mean noth- 
ing to him. Have they not all along declared that it 
would not come to this, that the Chaldasans would 
not invade the country nor lay siege to their capital? 
Had they not pointed triumphantly to the withdrawal 
of the Chaldasans on the occasion of their previous 
invasion as proving they were right? But if Jeremiah, 
who customarily prophesied evil, who had even then, 
when the Chaldaeans retreated, insisted they were not 
really gone, they would still destroy the nation — if he 
should hold out any hope, then indeed might he take 
courage once more. But the uncompromising Jere- 
miah bluntly tells him the truth, confirms his worst 
fears — "Thou shalt be given into the hand of the King 
of Babylon." 

Then referring, no doubt, to the turn in events 

1 Omit, in accordance with the LXX, the second wajjomaer. 



64 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

which has verified his previous prophecies and proved 
those of the official prophets false, he asks, ''What is 
my offence against thee and thy officials and thy 
people, that ye have thrown me into the dungeon? 
Where are now your prophets who prophesied unto 
you, 'The King of Babylon shall not descend uoon 
this country.'?" 

At this point Jeremiah very naturally seizes the 
opportunity, and beseeches the King to release him 
from the dungeon. And Zedekiah under the circum- 
stances cannot well do otherwise. A Herod, no doubt, 
would deal differently with Jeremiah for such audacity, 
but then a Herod would not have summoned the 
prophet in the first place. 

In this light the commutation of sentence granted 
to Jeremiah by Zedekiah has small significance. It 
does not show that Zedekiah took a personal interest 
in the prophet, nor even that he was in any way 
friendly disposed toward him. Least of all does the 
interview as a whole warrant the conclusion generally 
drawn from it, that at heart Zedekiah inclined to the 
course which Jeremiah is supposed to have urged, viz. 
that of making peace with Babylon, and that it was 
only by the superior will of the Sarim and their war- 
party that he was forced to the opposite course. As 
already pointed out, the strange inconsistency which 
Zedekiah committed in summoning Jeremiah was an 
act of desperation, for which history offers many strik- 
ing parallels. We need only recall the case of Saul 
who, when fate had turned against him, consulted, as 
a last resort, the witch of Endor, although he had pre- 
viously driven her and her consorts from the country 
and forbidden them the practice of their art under 
penalty of death. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 65 

2. XXXTV, 8-22 AND XXXVII, I-16 — xxxiv, 1-7, XXXII, 3-5, 
XXI, I- 14 AND XXXVHI, I-13 

It was Cornill who first pointed out that the proph- 
ecy of Jeremiah which was called forth by the people's 
flagrant breach of faith in reenslaving the serfs 
(XXXIV, 8-22), and the prophet's subsequent 
imprisonment in the dungeon on a mere pretext 
(XXXVII, 1 1 -1 6), stand to each other in the relation 
of cause and effect. 1 The date of that prophecy, as 
the time immediately after the raise of the siege of 
Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans, follows with certainty 
from the direct reference to this event in XXXIV, 2 if. 
Also the record of Jeremiah's imprisonment in the 
dungeon mentions the same event as marking the 
date of his seizure. And since he could not have 
addressed the people from the dungeon, it is obvious 
that his seizure and imprisonment must have followed 
directly upon his delivering the prophecy, XXXIV, 
8-22. On the ground of this evident relation of the 
two, Cornill tried to combine Chap. XXXVII with 
the two parts of XXXIV, that is vv. 1-7 and vv. 
8-2 2. 2 His attempt to combine them, however, was 
unsuccessful, (1.) because, as already indicated, there 
is no connection whatever between XXXIV, 1-7 and 
XXXVII (see also infra), and (2.) because he failed 
to see the real relation between XXXIV, 8-22 and 
XXXVII, being misled by the story about the 
deputation from Zedekiah, XXXVII, 3, 7a. 

1 See op. cit. Einleitung, p. XXXV, Chap. XXXIV, prefatory re- 
marks, and Chap. XXXVII, nff. 

2 See "The Book of Jeremiah" in SBOT; in his Commentary, 
"Das Buch Jeremia," p. 375, Cornill himself expresses doubt as to the 
correctness of his reconstruction. 



66 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

The fact that all the scholars except Duhm consider 
this story authentic, and also the corresponding one, 
XXI, 1-3, explains why none of them noticed that the 
prophecy referred to in XXXVIII, 1-3 is none other 
than the one contained, though incompletely, in 
Chap. XXI. Evidently they reasoned that, after 
Jeremiah was put in prison in order that he might be 
kept from prophesying, it was not likely that the King 
would publicly solicit his opinion, and thus give him an 
opportunity to prophesy again; and this reasoning 
led naturally to the conclusion that the prophecy, 
Chap. XXI, must antedate Jeremiah's imprisonment 
in the dungeon. 1 Duhm alone noticed that the 
stories of the deputations from Zedekiah to Jeremiah 
must be legendary, 2 but then in his ultra-radicalism he 
declared Jeremiah's utterances, XXXVII, 7b-io and 
XXI, 4-10, to be likewise the product of later times. 

1 Rothstein's remark to XXXVIII, 3 (in Kautzsch 3 ) justifies one in 
assuming that there was really such a line of reasoning followed in 
dating XXI, iff. Stade, following Ewald, sought to prove, in ZATW, 
XII, 2775., that XXXVII, 1-10 and XXI, 1-10 have reference to one 
and the same occurrence, and consequently tried to combine XXI, 
1-10 and XXXVII, 4-10 into one piece. Giesebrecht and Cornill, 
however {op cit., ad loc), rightly point out that such a view is impossi- 
ble, since XXXVII, 4-10 have reference to an altogether different 
situation from that described in XXI, i-io. Erbt tries to uphold 
Ewald's and Stade's view by a most arbitrary procedure. In the 
first place he omits from XXI, 2 everything that points to a different 
situation from that of XXXVII, 4-10, then (in accordance with his 
method in general) he reduces Jeremiah's utterances, XXI, 4~7b and 
XXXVII, 7b-io to less than three verses, viz., XXXVII, 7b, 8, 10, 
and finally he takes XXI, 8-10 as a separate utterance — an utterance, 
he argues, which Jeremiah did not make in public, but secretly, for 
the benefit of his political friends {op. cit., pp. 436:. and 267L). 

2 See op. cit., on Chap. XXXVII, 3. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 67 

(A) THE TWO DEPUTATIONS FROM ZEDEKIAH TO JEREMIAH, 
XXXVII, 3, 7a — XXXI, 1-3 — BOTH ACCOUNTS LEGENDARY 

In view of the contemptuous and hostile attitude 
of both the people and the government toward 
Jeremiah and their disbelief in his prophecies (see 
above), it would from the very outset seem improbable 
that the King publicly recognized Jeremiah's author- 
ity, by sending to him on two critical occasions high 
state-officials to inquire what he believed would be 
the outcome of the situation. 

A critical examination shows, in fact, that neither 
in XXXVII, 3ff. nor in XXI, iff. can the story of the 
deputation from Zedekiah have been originally an 
organic part of the records. 

In XXXVII, 311*. the story betrays itself as a 
legendary embellishment by the statement in v. 3 
that Zedekiah sent the deputation for the express 
purpose of beseeching Jeremiah to pray to God for 
them (hithpallael-nd bha a denu 'aeljahwa ^lohenu). 1 
The question immediately arises, what occasion was 
there at that juncture for beseeching divine interven- 

1 These words, which are of basic significance, are entirely ignored 
by Cornill in the strange theory which he advances. Cornill makes 
the purely arbitrary assertion that Zedekiah's real object in sending 
the deputation to Jeremiah, after the danger was averted, was to call 
his attention to the fact that he had again been wrong in taking a 
gloomy view of the situation (op. cit., p. 243). Had this been the case, 
there is no reason why the author should not have said so; least of all 
is there any ground, why he should have stated an altogether different 
reason. 

No weight, whatever, Giesebrecht to the contrary (op. cit., ad loc), 
can be attributed to the l e dorseni, "to consult me," of Jeremiah's 
reply in v. 7a. Such discrepancies as this, often much more striking 
ones, are, as we have already noticed, regularly met with in legendary 
records. 



68 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

tion? Had not the Chaldaeans withdrawn, and was 
not all danger for the present averted? The absurdity 
of the King's sending a deputation to Jeremiah for this 
purpose is still more evident, when one considers the 
action of the people in regard to their serfs. The 
reenslaving of the serfs as soon as the Chaldaeans had 
withdrawn shows that the government and people 
must have been absolutely confident that all danger 
was over. Had they still considered the situation 
grave, or thought it possible that they might have to 
utilize their serfs soon again for the defence of the 
city, their own interests would have forbidden them 
to forfeit the loyalty of the serfs by such a breach of 
faith. 

Equally obvious is it in Chap. XXI that the story 
of the deputation from Zedekiah to Jeremiah given in 
vv. 1-3 must be a legendary product; for unless one 
shares the opinion of Duhm, 1 Cornill, 2 and Erbt, 3 that 
XXXVIII, 2 is not an original part of the text, or that 
of Giesebrecht, 4 that XXI, 8-10 is the work of a later 
interpolater, there is no other conclusion possible 
than that the prophecy, incompletely recorded in 
XXI, 4fL, is the one referred to in XXXVIII, 1-4, it 
being the only one which contains the utterance 
quoted in XXXVIII, 2, and it containing this utter- 
ance verbatim. But is it conceivable that Jeremiah 
would be publicly requested by the King to prophesy, 
after he had been imprisoned just in order to prevent 
his prophesying? And were it conceivable, would such 
a thing be likely in view of the fact that, in his secret 

1 Op. ciL, ad loc. 

2 Op. tit., ad loc. 
8 Op. cit., p. 49. 
4 Op. cit., ad loo. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 69 

interview with Zedekiah a short time previously, Jere- 
miah had boldly insisted on his conviction that the 
country was doomed. 

Additional proof that verses 1-3 are a later addition 
may be seen in the discrepancy between verse 3 and 
verse 8. The former represents Jeremiah as addressing 
his message to the messengers of Zedekiah, telling 
them what answer they should convey from him to 
Zedekiah: "Thus shall ye speak to Zedekiah;" while 
the latter, which is closely connected with the inter- 
vening verses 4-7 both in thought and form, shows no 
trace of such a situation; indeed Jeremiah proceeds to 
state what message he has been commissioned by God 
to convey to the people: "And to this people thou 
shaltsay." The latter half -verse at once suggests 
that, like the second part of the sermon, w. n-14, so 
this first part must originally have been made up of 
two subparts, the first of which was addressed to 
the King and the second to the people. Thus, while 
suggesting the original structure of the first part of 
XXI, 4-14, verse 8a also throws light on the question 
of the original opening of the prophecy, and at the 
same time on the question of the original beginning 
of the narrative, XXXVIII, 1-13. 

(b) the original beginning of the narrative, 

xxxvrn, 1-13, and of the prophecy, xxi, 4-14. 

xxxiv, 1-7 — xxxii, 3-5. 

In discussing the question of the original beginning 
of XXI, 4-14 and XXXVIII, 1-13, it will best serve 
our purpose to consider the latter piece first. 

The verse which at present opens Chap. XXXVIII, 
1-13 cannot have been the original beginning of the 
narrative. The words, "Shephatiah ben Mattan, and 



70 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Gedaliah ben Pashhur, and Jucal ben Shelemiah, and 
Pashhur ben Malchiah heard the words that Jeremiah 
had spoken to the people," presuppose that a resume 
has just been given of the prophecy; what follows is 
merely a repetition of those parts which had given 
most offence — much, e. g., as in Chap. XXVI there is 
first a rehearsal of the Temple-sermon, then the state- 
ment that the priests and the prophets and all the 
people heard Jeremiah deliver it, and finally an inci- 
dental reiteration of the most objectionable part of 
the prophecy. 

This resum6, as we have called it, this originally 
preceding part is, however, not completely lost; it has 
been preserved, in part at least, in XXXIV, 1-3. 
Proof of this is XXXVIII, 3, "Thus saith the Lord, 
this city shall surely be given into the hands of the 
army of the King of Babylon, and he shall take it." 
This is not, as at first glance it would seem, a variant 
of XXI, 10b, but, with the exception of "into the 
hands of the army of the King" for "into the hands of 
the King," is a verbatim quotation of XXXIV, 2b, as 
read by the LXX: Outg)? elirev Kvptos irapahoaei 
7rapaSo0i]o-6Tai 97 TroXt? avrr) eh xeipas ficurtXecos 
T>a/3v\<x)vo<; zeal avWij fi-yfrerat avrrjv. — zeal /cavaei 
avrrjv iv irvpl, though in the present LXX, was not 
in the original LXX, as follows from the fact that 
it is lacking in the original text of the Cod. Mar- 
chalianus and in the Syro-Hexaplar is likewise found 
only in the margin. This identity of XXXVIII, 3 
with XXXIV, 2b leaves, first of all, no doubt 
that XXXIV, 2-3 must have formed part of the 
prophecy delivered by Jeremiah while prisoner in 
the court of guard; and, secondly, it suggests that 
XXXIV, 1-3 must at one time have been combined 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 71 

with XXXVIII, 1-13, in fact, that it must have 
formed the first part of its original opening. 

Nothing contrary to this conclusion can be deduced 
from XXXII, 3-5, where the verses XXXIV, 2-3 
reoccur, with certain remarks added, and also with the 
difference that Zedekiah is not addressed but spoken 
of in the third person. Jeremiah's purchase of prop- 
erty from his cousin Hanamel did not take place, as 
Duhm x and Cornill 2 argue it did, before the reopening 
of the siege of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans, or even 
before his seizure and imprisonment in the dungeon, 
but, as v. 2 directly states, and the words, "in the 
presence of the Judaeans that were in the court of 
guard," of v. 12, indirectly show, while he was a pris- 
oner in the court of guard. Jeremiah was not trans- 
ferred to the court of guard, however, until after his 
secret interview with Zedekiah, which, in turn, did 
not take place until after the return of the Chal- 
daeans. 3 And since the circumstances that led to 
Jeremiah's imprisonment in the court of guard in the 
first place, are explicitly recorded in XXXVII, 11-21, 
it is clear that either of two deductions must be made 
from XXXII, 3a, " Zedekiah, the king of Judah, 
kept him imprisoned, saying, why didst thou prophesy 
as follows." Either this remark, together with the 
following indirect quotation of Jeremiah's utterance, 
XXXIV, 2f., was inserted later by some one who had 
no longer a clear knowledge of the real state of affairs ; 
or vv. 3-5 formed from the start a part of the ac- 
count, XXXII, 1-15, and Jeremiah meant to convey 
the information, that it was because of the additional 

1 Op. cit., ad loc. 

2 Op. cit. y ad loc. 

3 Cf. Rothstein, in Kautzsch 3 , prefatory remarks to Chap. XXXII. 



72 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

offence he gave by his prophecy, XXXIV, 2L etc., 
that he was kept imprisoned by Zedekiah in the court 
of guard up even until the fall of Jerusalem. 

But not only does XXXII, 3-5 not contradict our 
conclusions that XXXIV, 1-3 originally preceded 
XXXVIII, 1-13, it furnishes additional support of 
the same. Apart from "And there shall he be until I 
remember him, saith the Lord," sa/3, 1 these verses 
contain in excess of XXXIV, 2-3 the declaration, 
5b, "If ye fight the Chaldaeans, ye shall not suc- 
ceed, " ki ihillalfmu 'aeth hakkasdim Id thaslihu. 
Though missing in the LXX, this declaration, by rea- 
son of its emphatic character, betrays itself as Jere- 
miah's property; and, although it cannot be proved to 
be a part of the resume, there seems to me no doubt 
that in the prophecy itself, i. e., in XXI . . ., 4-14, it 
had a place just as XXXIV, 2-3 had, in fact that it 
directly followed the latter. The proof of this is as 
follows : XXXIV, 2-3 (possibly augmented by w e sam 
tamiith, "and there shalt thou die," in accordance 
with XXXII, 5a 0, LXXA, 6) + XXXII, 5b must have 
stood in XXI directly before v. 4, and so must have 
formed the original opening of the prophecy. In this 
way the original structure of its first part, as indicated 
by v. 8 (see supra), becomes restored, while "If ye 
fight the Chaldaeans, ye shall not succeed," XXXII, 
5b, forms the connecting link between XXXIV, 2-3 
and XXI, 4-5. As pointed out above, 2 the thought 

1 Of 5a)8, b I consider only t ai poqdl 'ohto n e, um jahwa, "until I 
remember him saith the Lord," an interpolation; the reading jainutk, 
"shall he die" — no doubt the original reading — of Theodotion and the 
cod. Alexandrinus for jihja, "shall he be," of the Masoretic text 
shows clearly that these words must have been added later. 

2 See the synopsis of this prophecy, supra, pp. 6of. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 73 

expressed by XXXII, 5b, XXI, 4-5 * is, that the 
fight in which they are engaged must fail, since 
Yhwh Himself is in arms against them. 

Verses 6-7 do not seem to be an original part of the 
prophecy; they make the impression of being a com- 
ment on "shall die by the sword, by famine, and by 
pestilence" of v. 9. Evidently a later author who did 
not realize that famine and pestilence are the neces- 
sary resultant of warfare, a natural part of it, so to 
speak, thought some additional manifestation of God's 
wrath was meant in the form of a pestilence, and 
thinking the text incomplete in this regard, undertook 
by the addition of vv. 6-7 to supply what he thought 
was lacking. 

Now the fact that XXXII, 5b is evidently a part of 
the prophecy, though it does not seem to have had a 
place in XXXIV, 1-3, leads to the conclusion that the 
latter must originally have belonged, not to the proph- 
ecy, but to the resume of the prophecy with which, we 
concluded above, XXXVIII, 1-13 once opened. 

In regard to this resume, it seems clear from 

1 The Masoretic text of v. 4 is stylistically objectionable, to some 
extent even obscure. A comparison of it with the LXX leads to the 
conclusion that the phrases which it has in excess of the latter con- 
stitute later additions. These phrases are: ,a saer b e jaedkhaem, 'aeth 
maelaekh babhael w e , and w e, asaphti. With these spurious phrases 
eliminated, the verse reads: "Verily, I will turn to the interior of the 
city the weapons with which ye are fighting the Chaldaeans who are 
besieging you outside the wall." mihus lahoma, I conclude, is to be 
construed, not with mesebh, but with hassarim. It is clear the antithe- 
sis is not, as usually believed, between the open country and the cap- 
ital, Jerusalem (in that case the author would have said not mihus la- 
homd, but mihus lirusalaim or lair), but between the outer and inner 
fortifications. The meaning of the verse is that the outer fortifica- 
tions will soon be taken, and they will then have to concentrate their 
defence on the inner fortifications, i. e., on the 'opkael or acropolis. 



74 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

XXXVIII, 2 that XXI, 9, preceded by the introduc- 
tory phrase, "Thus saith the Lord," 8a /3, must have 
formed another part of it. For this latter part an 
interpolater, in all probability the later redactor, 
substituted XXXIV, 4~5a (exclusive of the concluding 
phrase, ki dabhar ,a ni dibbarti n e, um jahwce, 5b), for 
which verses XXII, 18 served him as a model. And as 
ki dabbhar ' a ni dibbarti n e 'urn jahwce cannot refer to 
any antecedent statement (in that case it would have 
to read ki m ni dibbarti n e 'urn jahwcz l ) , but to a 
following statement only, it is clear that it also cannot 
have originally belonged here. 

Also v. 6 betrays itself as a later addition, both by 
"in Jerusalem" and by "Jeremiah spoke to Zedekiah, 
the king of Judah, all these words." The first is not 
only quite superfluous here, but is unlike the definite 
specification employed by the prophet when he 
occasionally designates the place where a prophecy 
was delivered. The second shows that the interpolater 
erroneously assumed that the words addressed to 
Zedekiah must have been spoken in his presence. 2 
Verse 7 is a variant of ib (cf. infra). 

There is nothing surprising in the fact that the 
author of XXXVIII, 1-13, whether Jeremiah or 
Baruch, in proceeding to relate what consequences 
this prophecy had for the prophet, repeated XXI, 9 
with its introductory phrase and XXXIV, 2b. For 
the words addressed to the people, bidding them 

1 Cf. the frequent occurrence of this phrase in Ezekiel: — XXIII, 34, 
XXVI, 5, 14, XXVIII, 10, also V, 15, 17, XXI, 22, 37, XXX, 12, and 
XXXIV, 24. 

2 As this erroneous view is met with even among modern exegetes, it 
may be well to remark that it is not at all unusual for speakers even 
of the present day to apostrophize the absent head of a state or com- 
munity. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 75 

cease their hopeless fighting and join the ranks of 
the Chaldaeans, together with the emphatic words 
addressed to the King, declaring that the city is 
bound to fall into the hands of the Chaldaeans, 
were what formed, in the eyes of the Sarim, the 
really incriminating, the treasonable feature of the 
prophecy. They were the utterances to which the 
greatest exception had been taken, and this, by his 
repetition of them, the author meant to make clear. 

Modern scholars have wrongly taken exception to 
the utterance, XXI, 8, 9 and XXXVIII, 2, and have 
even denied Jeremiah's authorship of it, on the 
ground that such an utterance would actually have 
been treason. They argue that such an utterance 
from Jeremiah was the less likely, as, a short time 
before, he had protested with all his manhood against 
the insinuation that he intended to desert to the 
Chaldaeans. Their reasoning, however, is based on 
the erroneous assumption that the words really imply 
a desire or advice to surrender to the Chaldaeans. 
The bitter irony of the words escapes them. What the 
prophet really means to say is, — so vain is it for them to 
attempt a defence, so sure is the downfall of the city, 
so complete will be their destruction that only those 
who desert to the Chaldaeans will escape: every 
soul in the city will perish. This drastic way of put- 
ting it filled his hearers with consternation. Espe- 
cially they feared the effect of his words on the army. 
As the Sarim pointed out to the King, when demand- 
ing his death, "In speaking such words, he is bound 
to take the heart 1 out of the warriors left in the city 
and out of all the people" (XXXVIII, 4). 

The original heading of the prophecy, XXXIV, 2-3, 

1 m e rappe is potential participle; see infra, pp. io8f. 



76 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

XXXII, 5b + XXI, 4-14, must have corresponded to 
XXXIV, 1, that is, to the heading of the resume; in 
fact, it is possible that it was formed by what we 
called above the variant of XXXIV, ib (*. e., XXXIV, 
7), preceded by XXI, ia, "the word which came unto 
Jeremiah from God." On the question, whether the 
second part of the heading, that is, XXXIV, 7, and 
the original opening of the prophecy gave way to the 
story of the deputation from Zedekiah to Jeremiah, 
or whether they dropped out before the story was 
added, it is hardly possible to arrive at a positive con- 
clusion; however, this point is of minor importance. 

Cornill * and Giesebrecht, 2 in advancing the argu- 
ment that XXI, 11-14 cannot be considered the con- 
tinuation of vv. 4-10, overlook the fact, pointed out 
above, that Jeremiah in vv. 11-12 does not mean to 
give practical advice, but to set forth the one course 
by which the nation might have been saved; 'atnar of 
v. 1 1 has in reality the force of a pluperfect. A parallel 
case to this is offered by Is. XXX, 1-17. After pre- 
dicting the total destruction of the nation (vv. i3f.), 
Isaiah goes on to tell the people (v. 15) how their 
doom might have been averted, introducing this con- 
tinuation with ko 'aniar jahwce, "thus had the Lord 
spoken." Isaiah's reference here is clearly to the 
prophecy which he delivered at the time of the Syro- 
Ephraimitic campaign (cf. Is. VII, 4fL). 

(c) XXXIV, 8-2 2 AND ITS ORIGINAL CONCLUSION, XXXVII, 
7b- IO — THE ORIGINAL PLACE OF XXXVII, 4, AND 5 

In regard to XXXIV, 8-22, which was delivered 
after the serfs were reenslaved, I am of the opinion, as 

1 Op. ciL, prefatory remarks to Chap. XXI. 

2 Op. ciL, prefatory remarks to Chap. XXI. 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 77 

indicated above, that originally it was followed by 
XXXVII, 7b-io. There is a marked resemblance 
both in thought and phraseology between the latter 
and the concluding verses of the former; in fact, 
XXXVII, 8 and XXXIV, 22 read like variants. 
And if the second is eliminated, XXXIV, 8-21 and 
XXXVII, 7b-io 1 fit together with perfect sequence 
of thought. 

That we find the variants XXXIV, 22 and XXXVII, 
8 is not at all surprising, as no doubt the one is the 
form this particular declaration had in the prophecy, 
and the other the form it had in the excerpt of the 
same in the biographic chapter. 

The report, XXXIV, 8-1 1, introducing the proph- 
ecy, w. 12-22, XXXVII, 70-10, is fragmentary. As 
Cornill pointed out, the original report must have 
related the circumstances leading to the reenslavement 
of the serfs. XXXVII, 5 is, in my opinion, another 
fragment of this report. 

XXXVII, 4, "And Jeremiah could go about 2 among 
the people, as he was no longer kept in the prison- 
house," cannot have stood here originally, since we 
nowhere hear of Jeremiah's being imprisoned prior to 
his sermon about the reenslavement of the serfs. The 
verse, with the possible omission of "Jeremiah," I 
conclude, must have stood at the end of XXXVII, 21, 
after the words, "Thus Jeremiah stayed in the court 
of guard." 

XXXVII, if., as has been pointed out by Stade and 

1 At the beginning of XXXVII, 9, the text, as the LXX shows, 
originally read an emphatic ki. The prophet declares: "Yea, thus 
saith the Lord, do not deceive yourselves in that ye speak, the Chal- 
daeans have gone for good, for they are not gone." 

2 bo w e jose is potential participle; see infra, pp. io8f. 



78 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

others, cannot be considered an original part of the 
records relating to Jeremiah's persecution in the last 
years of Zedekiah's reign, but must have been added 
by a later redactor. 1 

From the foregoing analysis of Chaps. XXI, 
XXXIV, XXXVII, and XXXVIII, it follows that, 
like the legendary record of Zedekiah's interview with 
Jeremiah, the legends of the deputations from Zede- 
kiah to Jeremiah had their origin (even as had the leg- 
end of Hezekiah's deputation to Isaiah, Is. XXXVII, 
2ff. 2 ) in the erroneous conception which later ages en- 
tertained of the literary prophets. They looked upon 
them as political partisans — like the older prophets 
had been in their times — as public leaders who had 
influenced the political affairs of their day, and it was 
inevitable that their well-meant, though, as we have 
seen, most incongruous additions to the text should 
reflect this view-point. 

The fact that these additions or legends, which be- 
came incorporated in Chaps. XXI, XXXVII, and 
XXXVIII, have been considered authentic has nat- 
urally caused this erroneous view-point to prevail 
even up to the present day. Hence the historically 
untrue conception which is generally entertained of 
Jeremiah's activity as a prophet, and particularly of 
his relations to King and people during that final 
period when the country was struggling to maintain 
its national existence. 3 Hence, also, the equally un- 

^ee Stade in ZATW., XII, 282; Giesebrecht, op. cit., ad loc; 
Rothstein, in Kautzsch, 3 ad loc. 

2 See infra, Part III, Chap. VI, "Isaiah's View of the Doom and 
His Attitude toward the Political Affairs of the Day." 

3 1 take issue with the prevailing opinion that it was through Jere- 
miah's interference that the contemplated revolt against Babylon in 
the fourth year of Zedekiah's reign did not take place. There is 



PERSECUTION OF JEREMIAH 79 

historic picture usually given of Zedekiah as a weak 
and vacillating monarch, and of the conditions which 
prevailed in Jerusalem at the time of the national 



nothing in Chaps. XXVII and XXVIII to justify such a deduction 
(cf. supra, p. 61, n. 1). The fact is that we have no knowledge 
whatever about the circumstances which ultimately induced Zedekiah 
to refrain from the revolt. In this connection it may not be out of 
place to remark that the story of Zedekiah's journey to Babylon, 
Jer. LI, 59-64, is a legend; see Giesebrecht's proof, op. ciL, p. 245. 
I would add that the story, vv. 59-64, is to be looked upon as the 
effort on the part of the pseudonymous author of Chaps. L and LI to 
make more plausible his claim that Jeremiah was the author of the 
pseudo-prophecy, a procedure which has many parallels in apocalyptic 
literature. 

1 Of the various accounts of Zedekiah and of the conditions during 
his reign, the one by Erbt is particularly uncritical and subjective. 
His exposition is for the greater part purely conjectural. In illustra- 
tion of his method, it may suffice to quote his remark on p. 56 in ref- 
erence to Jer. XXXVIII, i9f. "Those Judaeans present in the camp 
of the Chaldaeans, of whom Zedekiah speaks as of a certain party, 
well known to Jeremiah, may be identified with these persons," i. e., with 
the family of Shafan and their political copartisans — a statement for 
which there is not even a semblance of basis. 



CHAPTER IV 
THE CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 

I. THEIR IMPORTANCE 

It was pointed out in Chapter II that the Temple- 
sermon was the decisive event in Jeremiah's career. 
This is true, not so much in view of the persecution 
and the change in his outward fortunes which imme- 
diately followed it, as in view of the far-reaching ef- 
fect which this persecution had on the prophet's inner 
life. 

It was as if the measure of personal suffering was 
necessary to bring his religious endowment to its full 
development. Even as Hosea's bitter domestic ex- 
perience led him, in advance of his age, to the realiza- 
tion that God was love, so the opprobrium and abuse 
which Jeremiah had to endure, led him through travail 
of spirit to a closer and more personal relation with 
God than we have evidence of in the case of any of 
his predecessor prophets. Forsaken by his fellow- 
men, driven into hiding to escape death, he found a 
higher fellowship, a surer solace, in the consciousness 
he acquired of God's nearness to him. His severe 
isolation served but to nourish and intensify his 
reliance upon God and to open his mind to the deeper 
spiritual significance of his mission. This saving 
sense of God's presence grew on the prophet until we 
find him exclaiming from a full heart, as the Psalmist 
later, "God is my strength and my refuge." Indeed, 

80 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 81 

with this sense of communion with God, Jeremiah's 
whole being became permeated and all his thinking 
surcharged. 

So in those years of utter loneliness originated the 
confessions — those dialogues in which the prophet 
pours out his soul to God, his human misgivings, his 
shrinkings from what he feels to be inevitable, his 
profound depression verging at times on despair, and 
on the other hand, voices the reassurance, the positive 
reasoning, the promises of strength and sustenance 
with which he feels his soul fortified and inspired after 
he has thus unburdened himself. 

These confessions are distinctly characteristic of 
Jeremiah. They grew, as we have already suggested, 
out of the peculiar conditions in his case, acting upon 
his intense and deeply spiritual temperament. The 
personal element we find more or less in all the proph- 
ets, but nowhere else do we find such complete revela- 
tions, such a laying bare of the hidden processes of the 
soul as in the confessions of Jeremiah. Needless to 
say, therefore, they are of central importance for the 
study of Jeremiah as well as for the study of prophecy 
in general. 

2. THE DATE OF THE CONFESSIONS 

The confessions in the order in which they are 
found in the Book of Jeremiah are: 

(a) XI, 18-XII, 3 a, 5-6, (b) XV, io, 15-21, (c) 
XVII, 5-10, 14-18, and its originally component parts, 
(d) XVIII, 18-20 (a fragment), (e) XX, 7-1 1, 13, (f) 
XX, 14-18. 

Of these confessions, (b) and (c) were produced 
while Jeremiah was in hiding, the former, doubtless, 
in the first year, immediately after his escape from 



82 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

execution, 1 and the latter, several years later, when, the 
first collection of his prophecies having been burned by 
the King, he had Baruch write them down a second 
time. 2 Regarding the date of XX, 14-18 we must agree 
with Duhm 3 and Erbt 4 that there is no clue to the 
particular occasion which called forth this outburst 
of despair. 

As to the date of the remaining confessions, the 
opinions at present entertained by biblical scholars 
are so widely divergent that no final conclusion has 
been reached. 5 In regard to the various views that 
have been advanced, it must be pointed out that they 
are all based on the erroneous assumption that all al- 

1 See supra, pp. 44f.; cf. also infra, pp. 90 and 97. 

2 See supra, pp. 15 and 19; cf. also infra, pp. 90 and 104. 

3 Op. cit., p. 168. 

4 Op. cit., p. 189. 

5 XVIII, 18-20 and XX, 7-13 are commonly assigned to the time of 
Jeremiah's persecution under Jehojakim, which persecution, it has 
been generally thought, however, did not assume a serious character 
until after his prophecies had been read by Baruch in the Temple. 
Erbt, although he holds with the other scholars that up to 605 Jere- 
miah enjoyed freedom, places these two confessions in the beginning 
of Jehojakim's reign (op. cit., pp. 184, 186). XI, 18-XII, 6 is by 
Giesebrecht (op. cit., p. 72) also placed in the second part of Jeho- 
jakim's reign, by Cornill, however (op. cit., p. 160), in the first part 
of this monarch's reign, while Rothstein (in Kautzsch 3 , pref . rem. to 
XI, 18-XII, 6) is inclined to consider it a product of the period prior 
to the Temple-sermon, and Erbt, who takes XI, 18-23 and XII, 1-6 
as two separate pieces, thinks that they date as far back even as 
the first years of Jeremiah's activity (op. cit., pp. 172, 174). In regard 
to XX, 14-18, Rothstein thinks they date from the same time as 
w. 7-13; while Giesebrecht (op. cit., pp. 113, 115) is of the opinion 
that they were added by Jeremiah as a conclusion to vv. yS., when 
he committed the latter to writing, which, he thinks, may have been 
at the time he was imprisoned in the court of guard. Similarly Cornill 
(op. cit., pp. 236, 238f.) considers these last years of Jeremiah's 
activity their most likely date. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 83 

lusions to persecution must refer to occurrences in the 
reign of Jehojakim. The scholars have failed to take 
into consideration that Jeremiah's life of persecution 
comprises two distinct periods, the reign of Jehojakim, 
and the latter part of Zedekiah's reign. It would from 
the outset seem hardly probable that all his confes- 
sions, save alone XX, 14-18, should date from the 
first period; and a close examination shows that both 
XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6 and XX, 7-1 1, 13 are really a 
product of the second period of Jeremiah's persecu- 
tion. 

(a) the date of xx, 7-1 1, 13 

To take up the latter confession, XX, 7-1 1, 13, 
first: — In seeking to determine the date of this con- 
fession, the scholars have laid undue emphasis on 
v. 7b, "I have become a constant target for laughter, 
everyone mocketh me." The statement which follows 
this is really much more important: "As often as I 
speak I have to cry out, have to complain of violence 
and abuse;" for it shows that at the period of his life 
to which he refers the prophet was exposed not only 
to insult, but to bodily injury. 

This conclusion is confirmed by verse 10. Indeed, 
the complaint in verse 10 that he is surrounded by 
spies who plot his ruin and seek to entrap him, clearly 
applies to Jeremiah's condition in the last years of 
Zedekiah's reign, when on a mere pretext he was 
arrested, flogged, and thrown into a dungeon. 

Further, by assuming that the confession originated 
in the last years of Zedekiah's reign, we immediately 
see the real force of the opening verses, and are enabled 
in turn to fix the date of origin still more definitely. 
In declaring that he has had to do God's bidding 



84 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

regardless of the consequences, he, doubtless, had in 
mind his daring action in the court of guard, when, in 
the very presence of the Sarim — heedless of the peril 
to which he was exposing himself — he had sarcasti- 
cally called upon the people to desist from their futile 
defence of the city (Chap. XXI and its component 
parts). 1 

Conclusive proof that it was really this event, or 
rather the consequences therefrom, that gave rise to 
the confession is to be seen in the prayer of thanks- 
giving with which the confession closes. Far from 
being contradictory, as has been thought, to the 
prophet's declaration in the preceding part that he is 
beset by enemies on all hands, this exultant outburst 
is quite in place. Jeremiah certainly had cause for 
thanksgiving after his rescue from the miry cistern. 2 

(b) the date of xi, 18-xii, 3a, 5-6 

This confession cannot possibly date, as Rothstein 
and Erbt hold, from the time prior to the Temple- 
sermon. It was clearly written at a time when 
Jeremiah was bitterly persecuted by the nation as a 
whole. Proof of this is the complaint with which the 
confession closes, that he was deserted and conspired 
against even by his nearest relatives, also the threat 
of his own clan, to which he refers (XI, 21), that they 
would take his life unless he ceased prophesying. 

We have no reason to believe that Jeremiah was 
actually persecuted before the Temple-sermon. Had 
he been, there can be no doubt that some reference to 
it would have come down to us in the biographic parts 
of the book, considering that these contain fairly com- 

1 See supra, pp. 53}:., 74L 

2 See supra, pp. 54f . 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 85 

plete accounts of the various phases of his persecution 
after the Temple-sermon. A certain degree of enmity 
and opposition to the prophet may have existed be- 
fore, but the great and general outbreak of hostility 
was produced by that event. 

However, while it is clear that the confession, 
XI, 18-XII, 3 a, 5-6, cannot be a product of the time 
prior to the Temple-sermon, it is equally obvious, 
in my opinion, that it cannot be a product of the 
period following that event, that is, definitely, of the 
period extending from the Temple-sermon to the 
death of Jehojakim. XI, 19 states most explicitly 
that the people were plotting for Jeremiah's death, 
and seeking to compass his ruin by preferring slander- 
ous charges against him, and v. 21, that his own clan 
threatened to kill him if he did not give up prophesy- 
ing. Now neither of these statements could apply 
in any way to Jeremiah's case during the reign of 
Jehojakim, for from the time he delivered the Temple- 
sermon, in the first year of Jehojakim's reign, until 
the death of that monarch, he was in hiding, and such 
plots and threats against his life would have been 
absurd, if not actually impossible. Jeremiah had been 
sentenced to death, not on any false charge, but for a 
very real offence (from the point of view of those 
times the Temple-sermon was a sacrilegious proph- 
ecy), and the death-sentence would have been executed 
immediately, had his hiding place at any time become 
known. Undoubtedly, the confession belongs to the 
second period of Jeremiah's persecution, when he 
was at large and prophesying openly. In those years 
when they were fighting desperately for their national 
existence, Jeremiah must have exasperated and en- 
raged his countrymen by his persistent declaration 



86 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

that the nation was doomed. In their eyes he was a 
traitor, and one can easily understand that, under 
those circumstances, his own priestly clan felt it 
their duty to take his life if he would not cease proph- 
esying, and that even his closest friends stood aloof 
and denounced him (see XX, 10). The fact that it 
was the foreign eunuch, Ebed-Melech, who came to his 
rescue when he was thrown into the miry cistern by 
the Sarim, and not a compatriot, as on the occasion 
when he was sentenced to death after the Temple- 
sermon, may be taken as indicative of his country- 
men's feelings toward him, and in fact, as charac- 
teristic of the situation in general. How bitterly his 
rescue was resented may be seen from the fact that 
Ebed-Melech's own life was not safe after his inter- 
ference in Jeremiah's behalf (see XXXIX, 17). 

(c) THE DATE OF XVIII, l8~20 

Finally, the fragment, XVIII, 18-20 — the beginning 
of the confession is missing and probably also the 
conclusion — must date likewise from the second period 
of Jeremiah's persecution, since it, like XI, 19 and 
XX, 10, refers to the people's plotting to get rid of 
Jeremiah by means of false accusations. 

From the foregoing discussion of the dates of the 
various confessions, it will be clear that, as they at 
present appear in the Book of Jeremiah, the confes- 
sions are not in their chronological order. Nor have 
the prophecies which at present precede them any 
bearing on their date, or for that matter, any relation 
to them whatever. This is true, too, of the bio- 
graphic piece, XX, 1-6, which relates Jeremiah's 
flogging by Pashhur because of the sermon recorded in 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 87 

Chap. XIX, for that the flogging-incident has no 
connection with the confession, XX, 7-1 1, 13, is 
evident from the date which we established for the 
latter. Apart from this, Erbt x and Cornill 2 to the 
contrary, the date of the flogging cannot be even 
approximately ascertained, as we have no way of 
fixing the time when Pashhur held the office of the 
Paqid Nagid. The statement, XXIX, 26, "Yhwh 
hath made thee priest in place of Jehojada, the priest," 
in no wise permits the deduction that Jehojada was 
among those exiled with Jehojachin in 597, or that 
Zephaniah held office from that time on. Indeed, we 
do not even know whether the office of the Paqid 
Nagid was identical with that of the Paqid. 3 Erbt 
himself called attention to this point (ib. } p. 15, n. 1), 
but failed to draw the logical conclusion from it. 

3. THE COMPLETENESS OF THE CONFESSIONS AND OF 
THE PROPHETIC WRITINGS IN GENERAL FROM A LIT- 
ERARY POINT OF VIEW 

The view has frequently been expressed that the 
prophetic works, as we possess them, are very incom- 
plete, both as to the number of sermons and as to the 
contents of the same; that is to say, that only a limited 
number of the sermons actually delivered by the 
various prophets have come down to us, and these 
not in full. Those who hold this view believe, for the 
most part, that the prophets were occupied chiefly 
with the oral deliverance of their message, and that 
they were less intent on the preservation of the same. 

1 Op. cit., pp. 15-18. 

2 Op. cit., p. 230. 

3 Instead of the plural, Paqidim, the singular, Paqid, is to be read 
in XXLX, 26, in accordance with the ancient versions. 



88 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Were it not for the zeal of their disciples, as they think, 
very little would have been committed to writing, and, 
as it was, much was omitted altogether, and the 
rest put into the form of abstracts. Add to this, that 
in the course of transmission other losses were suffered, 
and it seems to them clear that what has come down to 
us is but fragments and digests of original orations. 
To those who hold this view, it will not seem likely 
that a poet of Jeremiah's genius should have pro- 
duced only two confessions in the course of his ten 
years of hiding and, altogether, only six confessions in 
the space of twenty-two years. 

This view of the prophetic writings in general, as 
well as of Jeremiah's confessions in particular, is, how- 
ever, wholly unjustified. It seems to be due, prima- 
rily, to the fact that we are inclined to look upon such 
matters in the light of our own age of literary over- 
production, rather than in the light of the conditions 
of those times. We are apt to forget that, for the 
prophets who come within the range of this discussion, 
speaking or writing was not an every-day affair. 
It was not a profession with them nor a means of 
livelihood. They did not speak or write because they 
were expected to speak or write, or because it was the 
customary thing to do, but because they were driven 
to it by an inner compulsion, which, in its turn, 
sprang out of the exigencies of the times. With the 
delivery of their message their responsibility ended for 
the time being. When they had unburdened them- 
selves of the truth which, in travail of spirit, they had 
felt taking shape within them, with which they had 
reasoned and wrestled until overmastered by it to 
the point of expression — when they had thus fulfilled 
what they felt to be their mission, they returned simply 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 89 

to their usual avocations, until roused to fresh stirrings 
of the spirit by some new and pressing issue, whether 
in their lives as individuals or in the affairs of the 
nation at large. 

Thus Isaiah's prophecies, with the exception of a 
few to the exact date of which there is no clue, group 
themselves round, in fact were directly called forth 
by, the critical events of the stormy forty years of 
his prophetic activity: viz., (1) the civil war which 
raged in the northern kingdom, — this event, in all 
likelihood, marks Isaiah's appearance as a prophet, 

(2) the Syro-Ephraimitic alliance and campaign, 

(3) the investiture and conquest of Samaria, (4) the 
insurrection of the Palestinian countries against 
Assyria (713-11) ending with the conquest of Asdod by 
Assyria, (5) Judah's alliance with Egypt on the death 
of Sargon and Sennacherib's subsequent appearance 
in the country (705-701). In the tranquil intervals, 
Isaiah remained silent and in the background. 

As far, however, as the confessions of Jeremiah are 
concerned, properly only four out of the six come in 
consideration here, viz., XV, 10, 15-21; XVII, 5-10, 
14-18 and its component parts; XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6, 
and XX, 7-1 1, 13, (XX, 14-18 is solely an outburst of 
despair, the expression of a passing mood, 1 and XVIII, 
18-20 is a mere fragment). Now each of these four 
confessions marks a crisis in the spiritual life of its 
author. As we have seen, there are four stages to be 
distinguished in Jeremiah's persecution: (1) the years 
he spent in hiding immediately after he was con- 
demned to death; (2) the years he spent in hiding after 
the first collection of his prophecies was burned by 
Jehojakim, and during which he caused the second 

1 See infra, pp. 1275. 



90 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

collection of his prophecies to be prepared; (3) the 
time he was confined in the dungeon; (4) the period 
of time after his rescue from the cistern; and for each 
of these stages there is a corresponding confession 
in which the prophet's experiences, but preeminently 
his spiritual experiences, are reflected. XV, 10, 15-21 
is the product of the first stage; XVII, 5-10, 14-18 
and its component parts were added to the second 
collection of Jeremiah's prophecies, as, in a manner, a 
confession of faith; XX, 7-1 1, 13 we found to be the 
product of the last stage of Jeremiah's persecution; 
and XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6, which also dates from the 
time of his persecution under Zedekiah, may safely 
be assumed to be the product of the third stage. 
Imprisoned in the dungeon, without knowing whether 
he should ever again see the light of day, what more 
natural than that reviewing his life of suffering and 
devotion, he would be led to ponder over the problem 
of suffering! 

Few in number, however, as are the confessions, and 
brief as are most of them, there is nevertheless a 
completeness about them, a sufficiency, that stamps 
them as true products of art. As by a flashlight, they 
lay bare to us the complex workings of the prophet's 
soul, for, unlike the biographic portions of the book, 
the confessions do not deal with Jeremiah's persecu- 
tion per se, but only as it reacts upon him. In this 
way we get a definite and vivid idea of the prophet's 
suffering and of the effects of this suffering on his 
inner life, especially of the way it opened up his 
mind to the full realization of his mission. 

This quality of completeness, or sufficiency, as I 
have called it, is characteristic of the prophetic writ- 
ings in general, when these are viewed in the right 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 91 

light. The prophetic utterances are not, as too often 
supposed, formal sermons, moral or philosophic dis- 
courses per se. It cannot be too frequently empha- 
sized that the prophets were not preachers or pub- 
lic speakers in the modern sense of the term. They 
were rather poets, creative artists in the sphere of 
religion, and their utterances were all immediate, 
spontaneous products of the intuitive mind. 

From this view-point it is impossible to find any- 
thing abridged or fragmentary in the prophetic writ- 
ings, except in certain cases where there has clearly 
been something lost or misplaced in the course" of 
transmission. And in the same way it is impossible 
to find any justification for the other theory which has 
been gaining ground among scholars of late, that the 
prophetic writings were originally epigrammatically 
short and disconnected utterances. 

4. THE PECULIARITY OF BIBLICAL STYLE 

Both theories, i. e., the theory that the prophetic 
writings consist of epigrammatically short, discon- 
nected utterances, and the view that they are largely 
fragmentary, must be ascribed to a general misunder- 
standing of the essential character of Biblical style, 
or for that matter of Oriental style in general. Orien- 
tal composition presents certain peculiarities, or, 
more correctly, one radical peculiarity, which in its 
various manifestations both startles and mystifies the 
modern Occidental mind. 

Now, instead of accepting the seeming peculiarities 
as facts with a raison d'etre of their own and building 
up a theory in accordance with these facts, the tend- 
ency has been to reason them away as if they were 
mere errata, or to disregard them altogether. 



92 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

I had occasion above (see p. 37) to refer to this 
fundamental trait of Oriental style, and to point 
out that it manifests itself in the abrupt thought- 
transitions, in the seemingly unrelated scenes and 
stages in the narration — the juxtaposition of ideas, 
where not coincidence is to be understood but se- 
quence. In further elucidation of this point I shall 
quote from my article there referred to: 

" Occidental literature tolerates no sudden transi- 
tions; each link in the chain of thought must be 
given, and given in its proper sequence, and each 
situation be developed out of the preceding one. 
But in Oriental literature, quite frequently, the 
thoughts are joined to one another in an aphoristic 
manner, the author relying on the reader to discern 
the association of ideas which leads from one thought 
to the other. Similarly, in the progress of narration, 
situation is added to situation in much the same way 
as a series of events is depicted by a novelistic painter. 
Like the latter, the Oriental writer depends on his 
readers or audience to see the proper relation or 
sequence of the various situations." 

This Oriental habit of thought and depiction, so 
radically different from ours, must be constantly 
borne in mind, not only in interpreting the confessions 
of Jeremiah, or even the prophetic writings in general, 
but in interpreting any characteristic piece of Oriental 
literature, whether it be Firdausi's Shah-name, or 
Sadi's Gulistan, or the Hamasa of Old-Arabic poetry. 
A very pertinent illustration of this fact is to be found 
in Friedrich Riickert's article, "Bemerkungen zu 
Mohl's Ausgabe des Firdusi, Band I" (in ZDMG, 
VIII, 239-329, and X, 127-282), where, it will be no- 
ticed, in a great many cases the mistakes which Ruck- 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 93 

ert points out in Mohl's translation, may be traced to 
this stumbling-block of the abrupt transitions. Mohl 
was no doubt guided by his own modern stylistic 
feeling and so failed to discern the intentions of his 
original. Ruckert nowhere seeks to explain the cause 
of Mohl's mistake in this respect, but his own more 
poetic insight led him invariably to catch the thought- 
connection in spite of the abrupt transitions by which 
the mere philologian was misled. It was, in fact, 
owing to this unerring poetic insight of his, that 
Ruckert penetrated more deeply into the spirit of the 
Oriental writings than perhaps any other scholar in 
his time. 

The failure on the part of modern scholars to realize 
this tendency of the Biblical writers to disregard rigid 
sequence and formal transitions, has caused confusion 
in the interpretation of the other Biblical books no 
less than in the interpretation of the prophetic writ- 
ings. In a great many cases where Old Testament 
exegetes suspect that the text is in disorder or other- 
wise defective, there is in reality nothing amiss. 

It is interesting to note in this connection that the 
one example of this style which occurs in classical 
literature, the Elegies of Tibullus, has been similarly 
misunderstood. The Elegies of Tibullus were, in 
fact, looked upon as fragments, until J. Vahlen, dis- 
cerning their inner coherence, pointed out that what 
seemed to be fragmentariness was but a peculiarity of 
style. 1 

In my above quoted article I attributed this 
peculiarity of style to the seeming tendency of the 
Oriental mind to think by leaps and bounds. My 

1 See "Uber drei Elegien des Tibull" in " Monatsberichte der 
Berliner Akademie," 1878, pp. 343^. 



94 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

attention, however, has since been drawn to the fact 
that a similar peculiarity exists in one species of 
Occidental literature, viz., the folksong — the folksong 
of whatever age or clime. Here too we find abrupt 
transitions without any apparent links, sudden gaps 
in the narration which are left to the imagination 
of the reader to supply. As Wilhelm Grimm has 
expressed it with reference to the Old-Danish folk- 
songs: " Alles in der Mitte Liegende, Verbindende ist 
ausgclassen, die Thaten stehen streng neben einander, 
wie Berge, der en Gipfel bloss beleuchtet sind." l 

: See "Kleinere Schriften," I, 182; cf. also IV, 539: "Die Erzah- 
lung in diesen Liedern ist abgebrochen, deutet manchmal selbst das 
Wichtige nur an: sie beriihrt gleichsam wie ein einzelner Sonnen- 
strahl nur die vorragenden Spitzen eines Gebirges und lasst das 
Andere in Dunkelheit liegen." — I am indebted for this information to 
Professor Max Friedlaender of Berlin, with whom I discussed the 
subject after a lecture he delivered in Cincinnati on folksongs. Prof. 
Friedlaender had considered the abrupt transitions a distinct pecul- 
iarity of the folksong, as I had believed them particularly characteris- 
tic of Oriental literature, and it was a matter of mutual interest to 
have our views supplemented in this way. 

In view of the importance of this point for Biblical scholars, since 
the parallel in question illuminates and simplifies the question of 
Biblical comparison, I shall quote here also from Wilhelm Scherer's 
excellent characterization of the Folksong in "Geschichte der deut- 
schen Litteratur," pp. 256f.: 

"Trotzdem herrscht im Volksliede keineswegs immer Klarheit. 
Die Lieder sind nicht selten und gehoren zu den schonsten, worin die 
Meinung im Ganzen vollkommen verstandlich, auch jede Einzelheit 
fur sich deutlich ist, die Verknupfung der Einzelheiten unter einander 
und ihre Beziehung auf das Ganze jedoch im Dunkel bleibt. So das 
Lied: 'Ich hort' ein Sichelein rauschen.' Die Sichel rauscht durchs 
Korn; ein Madchen klagt um den verlorenen Liebsten; eine andere 
trostet sie: 'Lass rauschen, Lieb, lass rauschen!' und spricht von 
eigenem Gliick, das sie im Friihling erworben. Die Scene im Acker- 
feld, der Umstand, dass zwei Madchen sich unterreden, die Situation, 
dass der Dichter sie gewissermassen belauscht, dies alles muss errathen 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 95 

One might conclude from this that this manner of 
presentation must at one time, in the primitive stages 
of literary production, have been common to all 
literatures. 

In our analysis of the prophetic writings we shall 
find many illustrations of this peculiarity of style. 

5. ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF THE 
CONFESSIONS 

(A) THE CONFESSION, XV, IO, 15-21 AND ITS SEQUEL, XVI, 1-9 

XV, 15, according to all indications, originally 
formed the continuation of v. 10. Verse n is too 
corrupt to admit of any positive conclusion; what 
is intelligible of it, however, seems to have no relation 
to this confession. In regard to v. 12 no definite 
decision is possible either, since its meaning depends 
on v. 11, but, it must be noted, the Aramaic jaro ia is 
most surprising, and the reading of the verse in the 
LXX differs widely from that of the Masoretic text. 
Verses 13-14 are clearly out of place here; they are 
absolutely unrelated to the confession. Unquestion- 

werden, und der Gegensatz zwischen Friihling und Herbst schwebt 
nur wie ein ungewisser Schein iiber dem Ganzen. Die traurige Stim- 
mung aber, worin die Trostung nichts hilft und fremdes Gliick nur 
das Weh vergrossert, macht sich von vorn herein entschieden fuhlbar. 
" Das Errathenlassen ist iiberhaupt eines der wirksamsten Mittel 
des Volksliedes. Sinnliches wird ausgesprochen, das Geistige muss 
man merken. Die Liebenden sprechen weniger von ihren Gefuhlen, 
als von Kranz oder Ring. Es giebt auch Lieder, die ganz dramatisch 
nur in Gesprach verlaufen und damit zugleich eine Reihe von Hand- 
lungen, ja ein ganzes Menschenschicksal enthiillen. Der Zeitfort- 
schritt muss oft errathen werden: 'Dort hoch auf jenem Berge da 
geht ein Muhlenrad, das mahlet nichts denn Liebe die Nacht bis an 
den Tag' — und gleich darauf heisst es: 'Die Muhle ist zerbrochen, die 
Liebe hat ein End.'" 



96 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

ably they got in here by mistake from XVII, 3-4, 
where they again occur, but where they form a 
logical sequence with the preceding vv. 1-2. Verse 15, 
however, as Giesebrecht points out, 1 in its opening, 
"Thou, O Lord, knowest it," plainly refers back to 
v. 10, the contents of the latter being the object of 
jaddta; in this way v. 15 makes the impression of 
being the immediate continuation of v. 10. 

Verse 10 
" Woe unto me, my mother, that thou didst bear me, 
a man of strife and enmity for the whole land; 
I have not lent to them nor have they lent to me, yet 
everyone curseth me." 

"I have not lent to them nor have they lent to me" 
is Jeremiah's figurative way of declaring that there 
exist no personal grounds for the enmity of his fellow- 
men to himself. The effect of money relations upon 
friendship seems to be part of the worldly wisdom of 
all ages. 

No detailed description of the implacable hatred 
with which the people regarded Jeremiah after his 
Temple-sermon could be so effective as the trenchant 
words, " Everyone curseth me." In order to realize the 
full significance of these words, we must bear in mind 
the sinister power which in ancient times was believed 
to inhere in a curse. The belief so well expressed in 
Satapatha Brahmana, XV, 9, 4, 11, "Robbed of his 
power, robbed of the blessing of all his good deeds, he 
must depart from this world, who has been cursed by a 
Brahman," 2 belongs to the stock of religious notions, 

1 Op. cit., ad loc. 

2 Quoted by Oldenberg in "Die Religion des Veda," p. 519. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 97 

common to all nations of antiquity. In ancient Hellas 
and Rome, no less than throughout the Orient, people 
believed that a curse pronounced with proper rites, 
and by a duly qualified person, i. e., by a priest or 
diviner, was bound to bring earthly destruction on 
the person upon whom it was invoked, and to pursue 
him even beyond the grave. There is ample proof 
that this belief prevailed also in ancient Israel. It 
may suffice to refer to Num. XXII, 6, or to point out 
the noncommittal phrase, " May God so do unto me, 
and even more!" (II Sam. Ill, 35, XIX, 14, et alit.), 
used in place of the complete formula of an oath. 1 
The use of this phrase shows that it was common 
to refrain from uttering a curse even for literary 
purposes, so great was the fear that the curse might 
take effect even though pronounced without sinister 
design. The curse was resorted to particularly when 
the enemy was out of reach, as Jeremiah was during 
the time he was in hiding. 

Verse 15 
"Thou, O Lord, knowest it, remember me and pay 
heed unto me, procure vengeance for me on 
my persecutors not according to 

Thy long-suffering — 
take me away; know that I have borne shame for 
Thy sake." 

When properly construed, this verse is perfect and 
needs no emendation. Contrary to the accents and the 

1 Formerly an oath was substantially an imprecation. He that 
swore invoked the vengeance of God or the gods, as the case might 
be, if he were not speaking the truth, or if he should ever violate his 
promise. The two examples of this which we have in the Old Testa- 
ment are Job's asseveration of innocence, Job XXXI, and Ps. VII, 4-6. 



98 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

customary translation, "not according to thy long- 
suffering" ('al l e, aeraekh 'app e kha) is not to be con- 
strued with the following "take me away" (tiqqahent), 
but in accordance with the LXX and the Targ. with 
the preceding "procure vengeance for me on my 
persecutors" (hinnaqaem It merod 6 phai) ; "procure 
vengeance for me not according to Thy long-suffering" 
means let the vengeance be speedy, tiqqahent has 
here the same meaning as qah naphH, "let me die," 
I Ki. XIX, 4. The customary translation, "take me 
not away in Thy long-suffering," has been generally 
felt to be unsatisfactory; but, when taken as sug- 
gested, not only does the sentence make excellent 
sense, but the pathos of the situation is enhanced 
beyond measure by Jeremiah's following up his plea 
for vengeance with the request that God may rather 
let him die. To emend this beautiful and characteris- 
tic verse, as modern exegetes have done, by striking 
out the most essential phrase and thus robbing it of 
its loftiest thought, savors almost of vandalism. 1 
The passage shows that, although driven into hiding 
by the people's fanaticism, although hated and cursed 
by the whole nation, Jeremiah did not become a prey 
to his resentment. He was saved from permanent 
bitterness by those springs of loyalty and tenderness 

1 However widely Giesebrecht (op. ciL), Duhm (op. cit.), Cornill 
(op. cit.), Erbt (op. cit., p. 176), and Rothstein (in Kautzsch 3 , and in 
Kittel, "Biblia Hebraica") differ in their emendations of the verse 
in other respects, they are at one in omitting tiqqaheni. That the 
phrase is missing in the LXX seems to them to warrant their proce- 
dure. Evidently, however, the LXX had in this particular case a 
very defective text, for neither did they read 'attdjaddta with which 
the verse opens. Such a text can in no case have much, if any critical 
value, least of all, however, alongside of such an excellent text as is 
in the present case the Masoretic text. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 99 

which lay at the root of his nature, and which no 
amount of persecution could dry up. 

The temporary paralyzing effect which his con- 
demnation produced on him is described in w. 10-15. 
He was weary of life, and would fain lay down the 
burden. What had his efforts availed, his zeal, his 
devotion to the service of God? — Only to bring 
shame upon him, and to make him an outlaw among 
men. 

Verses 16-21 picture the reaction from this state. 
We see how Jeremiah drew strength from his trials — 
how he became surer of his mission, surer of God's 
purpose. In his enforced solitude he came to realize 
that within himself he possessed a source of infinite 
happiness, in God's revelation to him. His soul 
swells with gladness at the knowledge that he is the 
chosen servant of God. Hence the apparently sudden 
outburst in v. 16, relieving the gloom of the preceding 
verses : 

"When Thy words have offered themselves, I have 

[verily] devoured them, 
Thy words have been to me the joy and delight of my 

heart, 
For I am dedicated to Thee, 1 Lord, God Sabaoth." 

But while his personal happiness is complete, for he 
knows that he has given himself up to God, and that 
God is working through him, there is, nevertheless, a 
terrible shadow hanging over his thoughts, a great 

1 niqrd Um pHoni ( al means, as II Sam. XII, 28, Is. IV, 1 show, 
"belong to a person," "be a person's property," and, accordingly, 
said of God, the phrase means either "belong to Him" (cf. Am. DC, 
12) or, as here, "be dedicated to Him." 



ioo THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

crushing weight from which he cannot escape, the 
foreknowledge of his people's doom. 

In vv. iji, which mark this second seemingly abrupt 
transition, he cries : 

"I have not sat in the company of the joyful and 

rejoiced, 
I have sat lonely because of Thy overmastering 

force, 1 
For Thou hast rilled me with gloom. 2 
Why must my grief last forever? 
Why must my wound be incurable, ever refusing to 

heal? 
Thou hast been unto me as a deceptive brook, 3 
As water that cannot be relied upon." 

This pathetic outburst shows better than anything 
else how completely those exegetes have failed to 
penetrate into the spirit of the confession, who suppose 
that the craving for vengeance was uppermost in 
Jeremiah's mind. All that he has suffered on his own 
account, all the rebuffs, all the hatred and abuse are 
lost sight of in this larger sorrow he feels for his 

1 By jadkha the overmastering force which God's revelation exer- 
cises over him is meant (cf. XX, 7ff.). jad is elliptical for haezqath 
jad which occurs Is. VIII, n (cf. also Ezek. Ill, 14, w e jad jahwae 
i alai hazaqd). The elliptical phrase occurs again, though with a 
different connotation, in Is. XXVIII, 2, hinnl a h la'arae^ b e jad 
"who shall thrust [her] to the ground with violence." 

2 Cf. to this meaning of zaam the phrase panim nizamlm, "sullen 
face," Prov. XXV, 23; with a somewhat similar meaning Jfmath 
is used in Jer. VI, 11, "I am filled with the grim [pictures] of God's 
[revelation], so that I am unable to endure it." 

3 'akhzabh is elliptical for nahal 'akhzabh; the explanation of this 
figure is to be found Job VI, 15-20. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 101 

doomed people. It is reasonable to conclude that this 
sorrow weighed heavier on him during the lonely years 
he was in hiding, and that his gloomy forebodings 
deepened until he felt himself on the very verge of 
despair. 

But his reliance on God was too real, too deeply- 
rooted, and his will-power too great for him to become 
a prey to despair. He braces himself with the thought 
of his mission, and shakes off his weakness and depres- 
sion as apostasy: 

"Therefore, thus saith the Lord, if thou returnest 

[unto me], 
I shall let thee remain in my service, 
If thou producest noble things, not base ones, 
Thou shalt be my mouth-piece." 

What a wonderful piece of self-analysis we have 
here! Jeremiah confesses that in yielding to despair 
over the coming ruin of the nation he has shown him- 
self unworthy of his calling, has deserted the very 
post assigned to him by God, and acknowledges that 
he has to fortify himself if he means to remain in 
God's service. More than this, he concludes the 
verse : 

"Let them become converted to thee, sink not thou to 
their level," 

implying by these words that if he were to give way 
to his despair, he could never succeed in carrying out 
his task; he would just sink to the level of the people, 
whereas, by remaining steadfast, he cannot fail to 
make converts in the end. 



102 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

In vv. 20, 21 there is a note of triumph, of assurance 
after doubt, which lends to these verses the effect of a 
carefully worked- up climax: 

"And I will make thee as an inaccessible wall of brass 

against this people, 
so that they shall wage war against thee, but not 

conquer thee, 
for I am with thee to shield and to deliver thee, saith 

the Lord. 
Even so will I deliver thee out of the hands of the 

wicked, 
and redeem thee out of the hands of the might y." 

Verse 20 is practically identical with I, 18 of the 
consecration vision. But nothing could be more 
significant than this repetition. After all the years of 
fruitless striving, God imparts to Jeremiah essentially 
the same assurance and encouragement that he had 
given him when sending him forth on his mission. 
It was from this unbounded trust, rooted, as it was, 
in his consciousness of constant union, with God, that 
Jeremiah derived his conviction of victory, notwith- 
standing apparent failure, and drew the strength to 
fulfill his task in spite of the seemingly insurmountable 
difficulties opposing him. In accordance with this 
exultant trust he proceeds in XVI, 1-9, which may 
appropriately be called the sequel of the confession, 
to represent his lot of bitter isolation and renunciation 
as expressly ordained by God. 

Psychologically considered, the confession, XV, 10, 
15-21, as a whole, must be accounted one of the most 
wonderful and most logical pieces of self-analysis that 
we have in any literature. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 103 

(b) THE CONFESSION, XVII, 5-10, 14-18 AND ITS ORIGINALLY 
COMPONENT PARTS, IX, 2 2, 23, X, 23, 24, XVI, 19. THEIR 
ORIGINAL ORDER 

It was Giesebrecht 1 who discerned that XVI, 19 
must have belonged originally to the confession, 
XVII, 5-10, 14-18. 2 It certainly does not belong 
in its present place, among the spurious verses XVI, 
10-18, 2 1, 3 where it serves but to break the sequence 
of thought; there is no doubt that v. 21 is the im- 
mediate continuation of v. 18. 4 The genuineness 
of XVI, 19 is beyond question; the ardent expression 
of faith it contains is in keeping with the sublime trust 
revealed throughout Jeremiah's prophecies, and the 
hope for the conversion of mankind which it voices is 

1 See op. cit. on XVI, 19 and prefatory remarks to Chap. XVII, 1-18. 

2 The intervening vv., n-13, the majority of modern exegetes 
agree, cannot have formed a part of this confession originally. Verse 
1 1 has no bearing, as at first sight it might seem to have, on XVII, 5-8 
or IX, 22, 23, which, as I shall show presently, originally preceded 
XVII, 5-8, the subject-matter of these verses being trust in God and 
not dishonest acquisition of wealth. Verse 12, on the face of it, cannot 
have been written by Jeremiah; it has for its basis the eschatological 
notions of later Judaism, and, moreover, claims absolute sanctity for 
the Temple, which belief, we know, Jeremiah uncompromisingly 
denounced. Verse 13 betrays itself by its quotations from other 
passages of Jeremiah as an interpolation; it also differs in diction from 
this confession, and, it must be granted, has no weight in its present 
connection. 

3 It is generally agreed that XVI, 10-18, 21 is a product of later 
times. 

4 Verse 20 is a later, perhaps marginal co mm ent on v. 19b, sug- 
gested, as Giesebrecht rightly points out, by II, 1 1. This is clear from 
a comparison of the two verses; in II, n, "even though they are no 
gods," is a logical addition, but in XVI, 20 it has no point whatever, 
being added quite redundantly; it is really contained in the question, 
" Can a man manufacture his gods ? " 



104 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

met with again in III, 17 and IV, 2. 1 Giesebrecht, 
with fine acumen, places XVI, 19 after XVII, 10, 
remarking that v. 14 seems to have direct reference to 
such an utterance as XVI, 19. His reasoning in 
regard to this confession is most suggestive, and shows 
a clear insight into the workings of the prophet's 
mind. Giesebrecht also expresses the opinion that 
this confession was added by Jeremiah to the second 
collection of his prophecies, in order that, despite the 
persecution he was suffering, he might bear testimony 
to his innermost convictions (see supra "General 
Survey," pp. 15L and 19L, also infra, pp. 114L). 

I fully agree with Giesebrecht in his view regarding 
the circumstances that prompted the confession, and 
also in his view that XVII, 5-10, XVI, 19, XVII, 
14-18 belong together. I am convinced, however, 
that these parts do not form the whole confession. 
It seems clear to me that IX, 22, 23, X, 23, 24 were 
also at one time a part of this confession. It is gen- 
erally agreed that these two passages have no logical 
connection in their present context, and they are 
clearly not in their proper place. Some have gone so 
far as to throw out one or both of these passages as 
spurious. 2 To my mind, however, not only do IX, 22, 

1 That Jeremiah's authorship of XVI, 19 cannot be questioned is 
acknowledged also by Cornill, who remarks on this point: "Die Worte, 
welche die bekehrten Heiden hier reden, sind durch und durch jere- 
mianisch, und die Erwartung, dass auch die Heiden sich zu Jahve 
bekehren werden, liegt in der Richtung der jeremianischen Theologie 
und ist eine einfache Consequenz seines Religionsbegriffes " {op. 
cit, ad loc). 

2 Giesebrecht, op. cit.; Graetz, "Emendationes in Plerosque Veteris 
Testamenti Libros," I, p. 46, Stade, "Geschichte des Volkes Israel/' 
I, 676, Anm. & Rothstein in Kautzsch 3 declare X, 22, 23 spurious, 
while Duhm, op. cit.., Kuenen, "Historisch-Kritische Einleitung i. d, 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 105 

23, X, 23, 24 bear the unmistakable stamp of Jere- 
miah's individuality, but they show, moreover, a very 
close relationship both in language and thought to 
XVII, 5-20, XVI, 19, XVII, 14-18. I am convinced 
that these passages all formed part of one whole. 
Their original order was probably as follows : 

IX, 22-23, XVII, 5-8, X, 23, XVII, 9-10, XVI, 19, 
X, 24, XVII, 14-18. 

Read in this order, the various passages fit in with 
one another very well, and show a logical sequence of 
thought throughout. Unquestionably XVII, 5-10, 

XVI, 19, XVII, 14-18 are more rounded and complete 
when thus supplemented. A translation of the whole 
in the order suggested, followed by an interpretation 
of the same, will bear this out: 

IX, 22 "Thus saith the Lord, let not the wise man 
boast of his wisdom, 
nor the mighty one of his strength, 
nor the rich man of his wealth; 
23 but if one must boast, let him boast of this, 
that he understandeth and knoweth me — 
that he knoweth that I am the Lord, who 
doth work love, justice, and righteous- 
ness in the world, 
that it is in these things that I take delight, 
saith the Lord. 

XVII, 5 Thus saith the Lord, cursed is the man who 

trusteth in man, 
and who maketh flesh his strength, 
and whose heart is turned away from 
God. 

Biicher des Alten Testaments," II, 173, 176, & Erbt, op. cit., 209!!. 
throw out both passages. 



io6 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

6 He will be like the heath in the desert 
and will not see when good cometh; 

he livethin parched regions in the wilderness, 
in a barren, uninhabited land. 

7 Blessed is the man who relieth on God, 
and whose trust is the Lord. 

8 He will be like a tree planted beside the 

water, 
that spreadeth its roots by the stream; 
that feareth not when the heat cometh, 
whose foliage remaineth ever green; 
that taketh no care even in the year of 

drought, 
and never ceaseth from bearing fruit. 
X, 23 I know, O Lord, that man's way is not of his 

own making, 
that it is not in the power of mortal to 

choose and direct x his way. 
XVII, 9 Intricate 2 is the heart, more so than any- 
thing else, 
and frail it is — who can fathom it? 
10 I, the Lord, search the heart and test the 

reins, 
and to every man is given 3 according to his 

ways, 
according to the fruit of his deeds. 

1 Read, in accordance with the LXX, Symm., Vulg. haldkh for 
holekh and correspondingly, hakhen for hakhln. 

2 XVII, 9. The adjective, l aqohh, seems to me to mean not "deceit- 
ful" or "arglistig," nor even " triigerisch," but rather "intricate." 
This meaning accords both with the following half- verse, "who can 
fathom it? " and with the meaning which the word has Is. XL, 4 and 
Sir. XX, 6, viz., "rugged mountain path" and "impassable" respec- 
tively. 

3 In spite of the var. led., latheth without w e , the w e is to be retained, 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 107 

XVI, 19 The Lord is my power and my strength, 
my refuge in the day of need! 
To Thee the nations shall come from the 

ends of the earth and confess : 
Verily our fathers inherited but falsehoods, 
empty beliefs which are of no avail. 
X, 24 Chastise me, Lord, according to justice, 
but not in Thy [overwhelming] wrath, 
lest Thou reduce me to nothingness. 
XVII, 14 Heal me, Lord, that I may be healed, 
save me that I may be saved, 
for Thou art my glory. 

15 They, verily, speak unto me: 

Where is the word of God? Let it come to 
pass! 

16 But I have not grown callous as shepherd in 

Thy service, 
Neither have I wished for the disastrous 

day * — 
Thou knowest it, the utterances of my lips 2 
are everpresent to Thee. 

latheth being a case of the emphatic infinitive (like ul e bhaqqes Ps. 
CIV, 21 and wHasblth, Am. VIII, 4); the infinitive of the active 
stem is used here in a passive sense, as it is in Exod. XXXII, 29, 
wHathet ' a lekhaem hajjom b e rakha, "that blessing may be bestowed 
upon you this day;" in the present case k e is the grammatical subject 
of latheth. The use of the infinitives of the active stems in a passive 
sense is quite as common in Hebrew as in the other Semitic languages, 
a point which the Hebrew grammars fail to make sufficiently clear. — 
Emphatic infinitive seems to me an appropriate term for the Semitic 
infinitives, either construct or absolute, when used with the force of a 
finite verb for the purpose of emphasis. 

1 By jom 'anus, as by jom raa of vv. 17, 18, is meant the day of the 
downfall of the nation, both being cases of emphatic inde termination. 

2 By mosa s e phathai, "the utterances of my lips," Jeremiah has 
reference to his prophetic utterances in general; for this connotation 



io8 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

17 Prove not a terror unto me, 

[but] be my refuge 1 in the day of evil! 

18 Let my persecutors be dismayed, but let not 

me be dismayed, 

Let them be terror-stricken, but let not me 
be terror-stricken, 

When Thou dost bring upon them the day of 
evil, 

When Thou dost strike them with destruc- 
tion a second time." 

Before we can proceed to the interpretation of the 
confession as a whole, several detailed points must be 
discussed: 

hammithhallel, IX, 23 — The nice distinction, "If 
one must boast," or "If one cares to boast," is brought 
out by the participle, hammithhallel. One of the uses 
of the participle in Semitic languages in general is not 
to denote the occurrence of the action as such, but to 
express what may very properly be termed poten- 
tiality, i. e.j the disposition or tendency, or predeter- 
mination of the subject to, or its qualification for the 
action. 2 

of the phrase, mosa phi jahwce of Deut. VIII, 3 may be referred to. 
In order to have the meaning, "my prayers" (in accordance with the 
connotation, "vow," which the phrase has in all other cases), mosa 
s e phathai would have to be followed by an additional word, such as 
ba a dam. 

1 Verse 17a shows that by maJfsl 'atta a wish is expressed. Nominal 
sentences expressing a wish or entreaty are quite frequent, though this 
use of them is often overlooked. 

2 1 would suggest potential participle as an appropriate term for 
this use of the participle, several examples of which I have had 
occasion to point out before (cf. pp. 26, n. 5, 75, n. i, 77, n. 2); 
for additional examples see infra, pp. 182, n. 3, 184, n. 1, 202, 
n. 2, and 283, n. 3. Though of extreme importance for Old 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 109 

In the present case the participle, hammithhallel, 
suggesting the transitoriness of all worldly glory, is 
what gives the verse its peculiar tinge of sadness. 
This note of sadness, from whatever mood it springs, 
runs through Jeremiah's writings to such an extent 
that it may be considered as fairly characteristic of his 
style. 

"To every man is given according to his ways, 
according to the fruit of his deeds," XVII, 10b, is 
in perfect harmony with the first part of the verse 
(Duhm and Cornill to the contrary), as also with 
the confession as a whole. 1 Jeremiah has reference 
to retribution of a spiritual, not of a material nature. 
The verse is to be interpreted in the light of XII, 
i~3a, where the thought is developed that not ma- 
terial prosperity constitutes man's happiness, but 
rather that spiritual strength and assurance which 
comes only to him who lives a life of righteousness 
and is at one with God. Verse 10b is, therefore, 
a working out of the central thought of the con- 
fession, that man is absolutely dependent on God, 
and that his salvation lies in placing his trust in 
Him. 

" But I have not grown callous as shepherd in Thy 
service," XVII, 16: — It is the preposition min that 
gives 'us here a meaning practically opposite to that 
which it has with or without b e rei; similarly, e. g., 

Testament interpretation, this use of the participle seems to 
have escaped both the grammarians and exegetes almost en- 
tirely. As the full treatment of this point, however, would occupy 
too much space in the present work, it will be reserved for separate 
publication. 

^he reoccurrence of XVII, 10b in XXXII, 19 is altogether 
irrelevant for our purpose, as XXXII, i6ff. is not a product of 
Jeremiah but of a later age. 



no THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Hth lebh 'ael p e loni means " to mind" or " take notice of 
a person" (cf. Job VII, 17), but sith min p e loni with 
ellipsis of lebh, "to leave a person alone" (ib., X, 20); 
or gara with min rei means "to diminish," but with l e 
personae, "to procure" (ib., XV, 8). 1 Other examples 
where 'aJfre has the same grammatical force as here, 
and practically the same meaning, are: I Sam. XV, 
31, wajjasobh s e mu y el 'aJfre sdul, "then Samuel turn- 
ing back, followed Saul"; ib., XXV, 13, wajja ia lu 
'aJfre david k e, arba me'dth 'is, "and about four 
hundred men went forward under David's leader- 
ship." 2 

Jeremiah's declaration in this half-verse, that he 
has not become indifferent to his calling, notwithstand- 
ing the taunts spoken of in the preceding verse, is in 
accordance with such utterances as XX, j&., XV, 10, 

i 5 ff. 

"When Thou dost bring upon them the day of 
evil, when Thou dost strike them with destruction a 
second time," XVII, 18b: — Misnce is usually ex- 
plained as an accusative of specification, and misnce 
sibbaron sobhrem accordingly translated, "and crush 
them with double destruction." In view of the 
cognate accusative, sibbaron, however, misnce cannot 
possibly have this force; the modification would have 
to be expressed in this case by an adjective attribute, 
or by the status constructus, misne — an emendation 

1 Detailed proof that 'iis min has the meaning here stated must be 
reserved for a separate article. 

2 The scholars who emend meroa to merad in accordance with 
Aqu. and Symm., overlook the fact that though min may mean 
"wegen," denoting cause and reason, it cannot mean "wegen," mean- 
ing "concerning" or "about"; in the only seeming exception, s e mah 
m e 'e5aeth n el uraekha, Prov. V, 18, the correct and well attested 
varia lectio is b e 'esaeth. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 1 1 1 

which in fact has been made by some scholars, 1 though 
quite unnecessarily. MisncE cannot possibly be any- 
thing else than an accusative of time, "a second 
time." 

The explanation of the phrase, "a second time," is 
that the prophet evidently had in mind the previous 
destruction of the Northern Kingdom. This meaning 
of misniz does away also with the vindictive tone 
carried into the verse by the customary translation, 
" crush them with a double destruction." Such a feel- 
ing of vengeance on the part of the prophet would be 
in jarring contrast to the lofty spirit pervading the 
rest of the confession. 

This leads us to the further explanation due this 
verse. Verse 18b is not a coordinate clause, as it is gen- 
erally supposed to be, but the protasis of 18a. After 
he has just asserted in v. 16 that he has never wished 
for that disastrous day to come, and has called on God 
to witness that he is speaking the truth, it would be a 
rank contradiction for him to beseech God, practically 
in the same breath, to bring about the downfall of the 
nation. 2 Besides, v. 17 shows clearly, as do in fact 
Jeremiah's prophecies throughout, that he dreads that 
day more than anything else — he even prays to God 
not to fail him on that day of evil. It is psycho- 
logically impossible that Jeremiah at any time wished 
for the downfall of the nation. He believed the 
downfall inevitable, but, as we see from his ser- 

1 By Kittel, "Biblia Hebraica," ad loc, Giesebrecht, op. ciL, ad 
loc, and the Lexica of Gesenius-Buhl and of Brown, Driver, Briggs, 
s. v. 

2 Duhm, op. ciL, ad loc. and Cornill, op. ciL, ad loc, noticed the 
contradiction in v. 18, as customarily interpreted, to v. 16, but 
sought to solve the difficulty by throwing out v. 18 as an interpola- 
tion. 



H2 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

mons no less than from his confessions, this was a 
tragic realization for him, which constantly weighed 
on his mind and colored all his thought and feeling. 
It would be consistent with this frame of mind to curse 
the hour of his birth, as he does XX, 14-18, to wish 
that he had never been born to such misery and de- 
spair, but it would not be compatible with such a state 
of mind to ask for the destruction of the nation. As a 
matter of fact he nowhere expresses such a wish. In 
XV, 15, as we have seen, the utmost that he asks of God 
is to avenge him on his persecutors, and even this plea 
he follows up with the request that God may rather let 
him die himself. And in XI, 2 off. he does not ask for 
personal vengeance, but declares that God's vengeance 
is bound to come, because the people have rejected 
him. — XII, 3b is misplaced from Chap. XIV; see infra, 
pp. n6f. and i8oi. XVIII, 21-23, as Duhm rightly 
points out, cannot be the work of Jeremiah, inasmuch 
as they stand in flat contradiction to the preceding 
v. 20. 1 In the same breath that he reminds God that 
he has interceded for the people and sought to turn 
away His wrath from them, he certainly could not 
give vent to such implacable and fanatic hatred 
toward them, as is expressed in vv. 21-23. His 
reference to having prayed for the averting of their 
doom shows, in fact, how fervidly he loved them. He 
knew their destruction was inevitable, yet in his at 
times almost frenzied grief at this knowledge, in 
his recoil from the terrible prospect, he prayed for 
the impossible, for the suspension of God's judg- 
ment. 

It is clear therefore that XVII, 18b cannot be co- 

1 See op. cit.y ad loc. Duhm's view is shared also by Cornill, op. cit. s 
adloc 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 113 

ordinate with 18a; when it is taken, however, as the 
protasis of 18a, the whole verse becomes an integral 
part of the prayer, X, 24, XVII, 141!., and shows any- 
thing but a revengeful spirit. 

The verse is to be explained in the light of such 
passages as Jer. XIV, 18, "Yea, even prophet and 
priest are bowed in mourning x to the ground, void of 
knowledge," Is. XXVIII, 19, "Then it will be sheer 
terror to interpret the oracle," and the more explicit 
ones, Am. VIII, nf. and Mic. HI, 6f. 

" Days shall come, saith the Lord, when I shall send 
famine in the land, not famine of bread, nor drouth of 
water, but of hearing the word of God. They shall 
wander from sea to sea, from the north even to the 
sunrise they shall roam to find the word of God, but 
shall not find it." (Am. VIII, nf.) 

"Therefore it shall become night unto you, that 
ye shall not have a vision, it shall become dark unto 
you, that ye shall no longer divine; the sun shall go 
down on the prophets, and the day shall grow dark 
about them. The seers shall be put to shame, and the 
diviners confounded, they shall all cover the beard, 
because there is no answer from God." (Mic. Ill, 
61)— Cf. also Ezek. VII, 26L 

All these passages refer to the same fact, viz., that 
the people, because of the nature of their religious 
belief, because of their conception of Yhwh as their 
national God, are bound to be bewildered and con- 
founded when overtaken by their downfall, since this 
will be to them a demonstration of the impotency of 
their God; that they will, necessarily, be left without 

1 Read, as Giesebrecht correctly emended, op. cit., ad loc, sah e ru 
for sah e ru and omit, in accordance with var. led. and LXX, iv e of 
w e lo; cf. infra, Part III, Chap. Ill, § 2, p. 191, n. 1. 



ii4 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

anchorage, and without any light to guide them 
through the darkness which will envelop them. 1 

Jeremiah's prayer for spiritual strength is in no 
wise contradictory to the firm faith revealed in the 
first part of the confession. The prophet realizes 
that there is an essential difference between simply 
knowing that a catastrophe is inevitable and being 
actually brought face to face with it. This prayer is 
also perfectly consistent with the thought expressed 
X, 23, XVII, oi., that, owing to man's imperfection 
and his inability to fathom the depths of his own being, 
he is in constant need of God's guidance. It is but 
natural that a man thus humbly conscious of his own 
human frailty should pray that his faith might not 
falter when the dreaded crisis came. 

This confession is invaluable to us in that, like XV, 
10, 15-21, it is markedly introspective; indeed it lays 
bare the prophet's inmost soul. 

Jeremiah opens the confession by declaring that 
neither material nor intellectual things are of avail — ■ 
only spiritual things. He continues that man is 
cursed if he relies on material power and human 
strength — he will be unable to weather the storms 
and perils of life; but that he is blessed if he trusts in 
God — being firmly enrooted, he will defy and endure 
every evil crisis. There is all the more need for man 
to have trust in God, since he is absolutely dependent 
on Him. Both his character and his path are pre- 
destined — he "can neither choose nor direct his way." 

1 Ezek. XXXVII, 11 shows that this was in fact the effect which 
the final catastrophe produced on the masses when it actually oc- 
curred: "Son of man, like these bones is the whole house of Israel; 
they speak, our bones are dry, and our hope hath vanished, we are 
ruined." 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 115 

The mystery of his being he cannot understand, only 
the Lord penetrates and knows his inmost heart, and 
deals with him accordingly. Then the prophet affirms 
his own reliance on God, his firm hope of the universal 
conversion of mankind. In giving expression to this 
hope, his mind reverts to the trials that must precede 
its realization. Hence the abrupt continuation in X, 
24, XVIII, 14-18, in which he prays that God, who is 
the sole source of his strength, may uphold him in 
the hour of need, even on the day of the downfall of 
his nation. 

X, 23 recalls the consecration vision, where Jere- 
miah declares that he was prenatally chosen for his 
mission, that even before his birth he was ordained by 
God as His prophet (1,5). The two verses, X, 23, 24, 
must be ranked among the deepest utterances of 
Jeremiah. They not only reveal the spiritual depth 
of the man; they show his remarkable intellectual 
acumen, and prove to us, as do also XII, i~3a of the 
following confession, that Jeremiah had already pon- 
dered over those problems which, over a century 
later, we find occupying the author of the Book of 
Job. 

(c) THE CONFESSION, XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6 

XII, 3b, 4 do not belong to this confession. Verse 
4a, which speaks of the misery prevailing in the coun- 
try in consequence of a drought, although it states 
that this calamity has been brought on by the wicked- 
ness of the people, has no thought-relation either 
to XI, 18-23 or to XII, i~3a, 5-6; for the subject- 
matter of the former is the persecution Jeremiah has 
to endure in his prophetic career, in particular what 
he has to endure from his own priestly clan, the people 



n6 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of Anathoth, and the theme of the latter is the problem 
of suffering. It cannot be argued with Duhm (who 
would show a thought-connection between v. 4 and 
XII, 1-3) that the wicked, who are principally to be 
found among the upper classes, suffered but little 
from the drought, 1 for this is far from true. In ancient 
times rich and poor alike were affected by such a 
visitation, a fact, which, as far as Jeremiah's age is 
concerned, is proved by XIV, 1-9, where Jeremiah, 
describing the great suffering that has been caused by 
a drought, points out particularly that the rich are 
not exempt from the general privation. The original 
place of 4a was with this passus, XIV, 1-9, a fact, 
which has been repeatedly surmised, but not sub- 
stantiated. The proof that the whole verse belongs 
to XIV, 1-9 will be given in the discussion of the 
latter chapter, our only concern here being to show 
that it should not be included in the present con- 
fession. 

It will also be shown that the preceding half- verse, 
3b, as far as it is genuine, belonged likewise to Chap. 
XIV. 2 This half- verse consisted originally only of 

1 See op. cit., adloc. 

2 See infra, Part III, Chap. Ill, § 2, pp. i87f ., 189L 

We have had many cases of text-disorder such as this; they are 
easily explained. They occur throughout ancient literature, in Greek 
and Latin as well as in Biblical and other Oriental literatures. In the 
case of a lengthy omission, the copyist would add the omitted passage 
not in the narrow lateral margin, but in any available blank space, 
preferably in the available space at the top or bottom of the page. 
There were various methods of indicating the place where the omitted 
passage belonged, a very common one being the repetition of the 
words immediately preceding or following it. This, like the other 
methods adopted, was not understood by the copyists of later times, 
who mechanically inserted such passages in the body of the manu- 
script at the point where they were found. Cf. A. Brinkmann, 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 1 1 7 

haqdisem l e jom h a regd, " Consecrate them for the day 
of slaughter," as is proved by the fact that hattiqem 
k e son rtibhhd was not read by the LXX. Yet even in 
this reduced form it clearly breaks the sequence of 
thought, for in XII, i~3a, 5-6, the prophet is no longer 
concerned with the fate awaiting his persecutors for 
rejecting him, but with the problem of suffering in 
general, as he has learned to view it through his own 
particular case. 

XII, 1-3 a form, so to speak, the centre and kernel of 
this confession. But even apart from this, these verses 
are of the utmost importance, because of the evolution 
of religious thought in general which they show, and 
because of the insight they afford into the prophet's 
mind and soul. It is hardly credible that anyone 
should question their authenticity, for as Cornill 
rightly remarks, in refuting Duhm's idea that the 
whole passus, XII, 1-6, is a younger, postexilic product, 
"if anything in the Book of Jeremiah bears all the 
internal criteria of genuineness, it is XII, 1-2." 1 Cor- 
nill, however, should not have limited his remarks to 
w. 1-2, for v. 3a is a vital part of the thought. 

Jeremiah opens the confession by declaring that 
God's revelation has given him spiritual insight ; then 
he abruptly proceeds to speak of what he has had to 
endure in the pursuance of his prophetic task, what 
has been the immediate result of his devotion to God's 
service: 

"Em Schreibgebrauch und seine Bedeutung fur die Textkritik," in 
"Rheinisches Museum" (Neue Folge), LVII, pp. 481-497; and Paul 
Rost, "Miscellen — Ein Schreibgebrauch bei den Sophrim und seine 
Bedeutung fur die alttestamentliche Textkritik," in " Orientalische 
Litteraturzeitung," VI, pp. 4031!., 443ff., VII, pp. 39off., 4792. 
1 See op. cit.j prefatory remarks to XII, 1-6, pp. 154^ 



n8 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

" Since God has imparted knowledge unto me, I have 

attained understanding — 
Wherefore Thou hast caused me to suffer their evil 

doings" 1 (XI, 18). 

The meaning of 18b follows clearly from the con- 
tinuation. The fact that v. 19a forms a circumstantial 
clause, depending on v. 18b, admits of no other inter- 
pretation than that by the latter Jeremiah has refer- 
ence to his persecution. Only so do we get a logical 
sequence of thought: 

" But I have been like a docile lamb led to the slaugh- 
ter, 

not suspecting that they plotted against me: 

Let us destroy the tree in its sap, 2 

and let us cut him off from the land of the living, 

so that his name will no longer be remembered " 
(v. 19). 

In spite of their persistent hatred of him, Jeremiah 
has never been swayed by feelings of vengeance to- 
wards the people, but on the contrary, as we have 
seen, has wished that it might be in his power to save 
them. Even now, though cast into the dungeon, 3 
he does not ask for personal vengeance, but simply 
states that God's vengeance is bound to come: 

1 hodi a occurs with this meaning again, Is. XL, 13, "and (who) as 
His counsellor could impart knowledge unto Him?" (jodtaennu), et 
alit.; 'az expresses consequence here just as in Josh. XXII, 31; to the 
meaning of hir'ithani, "Thou hast caused me to suffer," cf. Ps. LXXI, 
20, "Thou hast caused us to suffer Qiir'Uhanu) many sore troubles." 

2 Read bHeho instead of b e lahmd, an emendation by Hitzig which 
has been generally accepted. 

8 See supra, p. 90. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 119 

" But Thou, O Lord Sabaoth, art the righteous judge, 

who testest the reins and the heart; 

I shall see Thy vengeance on them, 

for unto Thee do I reveal my cause" (v. 20). 

The people of Anathoth, he continues, shall perish 
on the day of doom for rejecting him, and for threaten- 
ing to kill him if he would not cease prophesying 
(vv. 21-23). 

In XII, 1 there is another abrupt transition. From 
brooding over his own persecution, Jeremiah is led to 
consider the problem of suffering in general: 

" Absolutely righteous art Thou, O God, 

even though I venture to dispute with Thee — 

yet of a question of justice I desire to speak unto Thee : 

Why is the way of the wicked prosperous? 

Why are all faithless people at ease? 

Thou hast planted them, hence they take root, thrive, 

even yield fruit. 
Near art Thou to their mouth, but far from their 
heart — but Thou, O God, Thou knowest me, Thou 

seest me ever, 
Thou hast tried my heart which is at one with Thee" 

(XII, i- 3 a). 

God's ways, he says by way of preface, are beyond 
human comprehension — the divine world-economy 
must forever be a mystery to man. Then he proceeds 
to give the solution of the problem in the light of his 
own religious experience: — Man being centered in 
God, finds true happiness only by living in harmony 
with the Divine. 

This at-oneness with God is for Jeremiah the real 



i2o THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

prosperity, the only thing that counts, and the con- 
sciousness that he possesses this supreme good has 
been his solace in suffering, his strength amidst all 
opposition. His assurance might be expressed in the 
words of the psalmist later: 

"If I have but Thee (God), I care not about heaven 
or earth." 1 (Ps. LXXIII, 23.) 

Verses 5 and 6 give a new train of thought, the 
words of God in answer to Jeremiah's communings: 

"If thou racest with foot-runners, and they exhaust 

thee, 
how wilt thou compete with horses? 
And if only in the land of peace thou feelest secure, 
what wilt thou do in the majestic jungle of the Jor- 
dan? 2 
Yea, even thy brothers, and the house of thy father, 
even they have become treacherous against thee, 

1 The real meaning of this verse is obscured in most of the transla- 
tions. Luther alone renders it adequately: " Wenn ich nur dich habe, 
so frage ich nichts nach Himmel und Erde." 

2 By g e 'on hajjarden the forest region extending along the Jordan is 
meant, as is shown by "As the lion cometh forth from the majestic 
jungle of the Jordan to the banks of the flowing river" ('ael n e we 
'ethan), XLIX, 19, L, 44; g e, on is elliptical for g e, onjaar; the proof 
of this I find in the k e bhod ja'ar, Is. X, 18. Similarly n e we 'ethan, 
which is commonly misunderstood, and which has even been emended, 
is ellipsis for n e we n e har 'ethan, and ja'Hce is not to be translated 
"ascendeth," but "cometh forth," cf. l ala 'arje missubkho, Jer. IV, 
7. The animals of the jungle go to the river-banks not so much to 
drink as to seek prey. 

There are not a few cases where elliptical phrases have not been 
recognized as such, and where consequently the passages have been 
misinterpreted or unnecessary text-emendations resorted to, as here. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 121 

even they talk without reserve behind thy back; 
do not trust them if they speak kindly to thee." 

The relevancy of this answer is not immediately 
apparent, but there is no doubt that these verses are 
supplementary to 3a: "Thou hast tried my heart, 
which is at one with Thee" (" tried my heart," i. e., 
by suffering) , and that they are consequently part of 
the prophet's general explanation of suffering. Jere- 
miah feels the hostility to himself growing more bitter 
— even his immediate relatives are plotting against 
him; he foresees still greater trials ahead of him, and he 
girds his soul for the combat. The prophet of God, he 
tells himself, must mind no hardships, must shrink 
from no trial. Only thus can he hope to fulfil his 
mission. He is conscious withal that his suffering has 
brought its own compensation, that it has given him 
the spiritual understanding which makes his heart at 
one with God, and in the blending of these two lines of 
thought this confession offers a lofty solution of the 
problem of suffering. The metaphysical aspect of the 
question does not interest Jeremiah further; it is the 
effect of suffering on man's spiritual development that 
is to him the all-important consideration. In the 
light of its actual fruitage, the Why of human suffering 
is of little moment. 

(d) the confession, xx, 7-1 1, 13 

Vv. 7-10 "Thou, God, hast enthralled me, and I am 
enthralled; 1 
Thou hast seized and overpowered me. 

1 The usual translations of pittithani waaeppath, "Thou hast 
deceived me, and I am deceived"; "du hast mich betort, und ich liess 
mich betoren": "... verlockt . . ."; "... iiberredet . . .," 



122 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

I have become a constant target for laugh- 
ter; everyone mocketh me. 
For as often as I speak I have to cry out, 
have to complain of violence and abuse, 1 
for the word of God but serveth to bring 

upon me 
insult and derision without end — 
And I thought I will not heed Him, 
I will not speak any more in His name; 
but it was within me as a raging fire, shut up 

in my bosom; 
I strove to withstand it, but I could not. 
Yea, 2 1 hear the whispering of many, attack 

on all sides: 
inform on him, or let us play the informer; 
everyone of my bosom friends is watching to 

contrive my downfall: 
perhaps he will let himself be entrapped, 
so that we may get him into our power and 
take revenge on him." 

The singular significance of w. 7-9 has been 
pointed out before. 3 In declaring that the voice of 
God within him has proved itself the all-controlling 
force of his life, so that he must obey its bidding with- 
out regard for the consequences, Jeremiah is speaking 
not only from the force of conviction, but from the 

are inadequate, to some extent even misleading. In my above render- 
ing of the words, I have sought to express more closely the connota- 
tion which they are acknowledged to have here, viz., the overmaster- 
ing, impelling force of God's revelation from which there is no escape. 

1 hamas wasod are accusatives of specification. 

2 ki, opening the verse, is emphatic hi. 

3 See supra, pp. 9 and 2>$i. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 123 

fullness of his long experience, for this confession dates 
from the last year of his activity. 

That verses of such beauty and cumulative force, as 
7-9, should be the target for text-emendation, as these 
verses have been to all later exegetes, 1 is difficult to 
understand; particularly, that they should be sub- 
jected to emendations for metrical and strophic rea- 
sons is well-nigh inexcusable, in view of the uncer- 
tainty that still prevails in regard to the Hebrew meter 
and strophic structure. Whether considered from the 
point of view of grammar, sense, or poetic force, verses 
7-9 are unimpeachable. 2 

Among the changes made by Duhm and Cornill is 
the combining for strophic and other reasons of 
utfniVethi kalkhel uflo 'ukhal with the following verse 
10 and the insertion at the same time of ,a ni after w e . 
The whole is then taken to refer to Jeremiah's perse- 
cution. But Jeremiah's renewed outcry in v. 10 be- 
cause of his persecution, is followed up in verse 11a 
by the emphatic declaration, wajjahwae 'othi k e gibbor 
'arts, "But since God is with me, I triumph like a 
hero." It is highly improbable that two such con- 
tradictory statements should follow each other so 

1 For the various emendations that have been made see Duhm, 
op. cit., ad loc; Cornill, op. cit., ad loc, and "Die metrischen Stiicke 
des Buches Jeremia untersucht, " p. 27; Giesebrecht, op. cit., ad loc, 
and " Jeremias Metrik," pp. 35f.; Erbt, op. cit., p. 184; and Rothstein 
in Kautzsch 3 and in Kittel, "Biblia Hebraica," ad loc. 

2 In v. 9 the masculine form of the second adjective phrase, i aswr i 
modifying 'es is grammatically unobjectionable (c/. Ges.-Kautzsch, 
"Hebr. Grammatik," 28 § 132, d). ia samoth is used synonymously 
with lebh to connote emotions (just as in Ps. VI, 3L, XXXV, gi. it is 
synonymous with naephaes), possibly the best English word with 
which to render it is "bosom"; 'es boaeraeth, it hardly needs to be re- 
marked, is an equivalent expression to 'es lohet or 'Is laehabha. 



124 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

closely, unless there were something in the text which 
would show the discrepancy to be but a seeming one. 
This is not the case however. Verse 9b combined with 
v. 10 makes a bald contradiction to the following v. 11, 
but construed in the traditional way with v. 9a, it 
gives an unassailable text. 

K e gibbor 'arts of v. 11 is appositive to 'othi, and not, 
as has been generally thought, to jahwae, or more 
exactly 'otki is both predicate of jahwae and virtual 
subject of k e of k e gibbor 'arts. Kimchi, in the thir- 
teenth century, pointed out the possibility of this 
construction. It is, however, not merely a possible 
construction, it is the only possible construction. 
Not only would the comparison here of Yhwh with a 
"valiant hero," or " a terrible hero," as some translate, 
have no point, but inasmuch as it would arrest the 
attention, it would take all the force out of the asser- 
tion, " but God is with me." On the other hand, when 
we translate, " Since God is with me, I triumph like a 
hero," the thought is excellent, and forms an appro- 
priate finish to the reflections of w. 7-10. More than 
this, the utterance is peculiarly characteristic of 
Jeremiah, revealing, as it does, the spirit which ani- 
mates all his prophecies. It might, indeed, be taken as 
the keynote of his preaching, and for that matter, as the 
keynote of prophecy in general; for, as cannot be too 
strongly emphasized, it was the belief that God was 
with them that moved the prophets to take up their 
mission, and that sustained them through all the 
hardships which the pursuance of their mission en- 
tailed. 1 

1 It seems to have been generally felt by modern exegetes that the 
traditional translation of v. 11 was unsatisfactory, and this was, no 
doubt, an additional reason with Duhm (in "Das Buch Jeremia 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 125 

The rest of v. 11 accords in tenor and spirit with the 
first part. Jeremiah does not give expression here to 
any feelings of revenge, but, having just declared that 
the Lord being with him he triumphs like a hero, he 
continues : 

" Hence my persecutors must exhaust themselves and 

accomplish nothing, 
They suffer great shame, because they succeed not; 
their shame will never be forgotten." 1 

In proof of the fact that jikkaHu has here the 
meaning "must exhaust themselves," 2 and not, as 
usually translated, "must stumble" or "fall," the 
corresponding passage in the LXX may be referred 
to: Sia tovto iSicoljav fcal vorjcrat ovtc rjSvvavro. It will 
be seen that, though varying in expression, the Greek 
is practically identical in meaning with the Hebrew 
of v. 11a: 3 "Hence they persecute me, 4 but accom- 
plish nothing." 

The confession closes in v. 13 with a song of thanks- 
giving to God for delivery "from the hand of the evil- 
doers," which is clearly a reference to Jeremiah's 

iibersetzt," ad loc), and Cornill (op. cit., ad he.) for cutting the verse 
out altogether as an interpolation. 

1 Read in accordance with the LXX, Wlimmotham l ei olam instead 
of kHimmath ' olam. 

2 For other examples of kasal meaning "to exhaust oneself" or 
"to be exhausted," cf. Ps. XXXI, 11, Neh. IV, 4, II Chron. 
XXVIII, 15, et alit. 

3 Rothstein in Kittel, "Biblia Hebraica," correctly retranslated the 
Greek text ( al hen rad e phu w e hashel lojakholii. 

4 'othi, the nominal predicate of the preceding sentence, is to be 
construed as object with rad e phu, a by no means infrequent construc- 
tion. 



126 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

rescue from the cistern. The fact that the confession 
originated shortly after this occurrence disproves the 
objections raised by the exegetes against the authen- 
ticity of the verse (cf. supra, p. 84). 

Verse 12 cannot have formed a part of the confes- 
sion originally. It is a repetition of XI, 20, and, while 
in the latter place the verse has a raison d'etre, here, 
after 11b, it has no force. In all probability it was 
added from XI, 20 by some later reader, as a marginal 
comment. 

Like the preceding confession, XI, 18-XII, 3a, 5-6, 
the confession, XX, 7-1 1, 13 is of extreme value in 
fixing Jeremiah's importance as a prophet, and in 
showing the evolution of religious thought in general. 
The realization of the power of the divine within the 
human heart, and the consciousness of constant com- 
munion with God, met with in Jeremiah, mark a 
spiritualization of religion in a degree which was not 
reached before, and which has not been surpassed 
since. The fact that it dates from the last year of 
Jeremiah's activity, and that it is probably the last 
thing he produced, attaches a special significance to 
this confession. It is as if the summing up of his 
experience in the opening verses 7-9, " Thou, O God, 
hast enthralled me, and I am enthralled; Thou hast 
seized and overpowered me . . . ," and the exultant 
declaration in the concluding part, " Since God is 
with me, I triumph like a hero," were meant to serve, 
at the same time, as a specification of the spiritual 
legacy he was leaving to mankind. 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 127 

(e) the confession, XX, 14-18 

" Cursed be the day that I was born! 

Let not the day that my mother bore me be blessed. 

Cursed be the man who brought the glad tidings to my 

father : 
1 A male child is born unto thee ' — 
[and] filled him with joy. 1 
May that man be like the cities which God overthrew 

mercilessly, 
May he hear screams of anguish in the morning, 
cries of alarm at noon-tide. 
Would that they had killed 2 me at birth, 
or that my mother had been my grave, 
and her womb carried me for all time. 
Wherefore came I forth from the womb 
to see misery and woe, that my days should vanish in 

despair?" 

Though there is no clue to the particular occasion 
that called forth this piece, it may be assumed that 
it was in an hour when the prophet felt completely 
crushed by his grief, when his cup of bitterness seemed 
full, and his burden greater than he could bear. 

In striking contrast to the other confessions, these 
verses contain no ray of hope or assurance to relieve 
the gloom, no comforting reflection, no transition of 
thought whatever. In fact, we have not a train of 
thought at all, but one single all-engrossing thought, 
and the whole is just the passionate expression of one 

1 Verse 15b is a circumstantial clause. 

2 Read fcO instead of &O; ,a saer may be taken as m saer recitativum, 
introducing 1 a new thought; the 3rd singular of mdthHhanl is used 
impersonally. 



128 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

mood. That the customary transition followed, that 
a line of thought got started which changed the 
prophet's mood and led to his usual positive assurance, 
is most probable; that a passage containing such a 
sequel became lost in the course of transmission is 
possible; but it is far from my present purpose to put 
forth such a theory. It may well have been so, but 
the point is hardly material here. As it stands the 
passage is the expression of a passing mood, and, as 
such, cannot invalidate any conclusions that have 
been reached regarding the other confessions. 

In particular, it offers no warrant for the inference 
frequently drawn from it, that Jeremiah's faith 
wavered in the end, that his erstwhile indomitable 
fortitude and serene harmony broke down under se- 
vere trials and gave way to despair and discord. 1 One 
might just as well argue that Jesus in the end gave 
way to despair, because in his death-agony he cried: 
"Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? — My God, my God, why 
hast thou forsaken me? " 

In regard to its date only the negative conclusion is 
possible, that it did not immediately follow vv. 7-13. 
It would be psychologically impossible, as in fact the 
exegetes grant, for such faith, such surrender, such 
spiritual exultation, as expressed in vv. 7-13, to be 
followed immediately by such utter dejection and 
bitterness of spirit, as we find in vv. 14-18. 

Since these latter verses have no internal connection 
with the preceding confession, and since, as we have 
seen, the external connection or order of any confession 
has no chronological significance, the present position 

1 Such an inference is drawn by Giesebrecht, "Das Buch Jeremia, " 
pp. 113-115; Duhm, "Das Buch Jeremia," p. 138; and Cornill, "Das 
Buch Jeremia," pp. 235f., 2381". 



CONFESSIONS OF JEREMIAH 129 

of w. 14-18, it must be granted, is entirely fortuitous. 
The passage is the expression of a mood into which the 
prophet might have fallen at almost any period of his 
life when the torturings of his own soul and the 
slings and arrows of his fellow-men combined to op- 
press him. We have reason to believe that through 
some line of spiritual reasoning, born of his per- 
sonality and experience, the prophet always emerged 
from such moods to confidence and buoyancy, but in 
this case, from whatever cause, the line of reasoning 
does not follow. We have simply an isolated expres- 
sion of despondency, which has no further importance 
for us than as showing how keenly at times the prophet 
felt the bitterness of his lot. 1 

1 Cornill's remark, in disposing of the question of the connection 
between w. 7-1 1, 13 and vv. 14-18, may be taken as a tacit ac- 
knowledgment that the methodical interpretation of 7-1 1, 13 permits 
no other conclusion than the one here expressed. He writes: "Sind 
alle drei Verse n-13 nicht urspriinglich, so ist damit auch die grosse 
Schwierigkeit des Anschlusses an v. 14-18 behoben. Hatte der 
Prophet sich zu der festen Zuversicht der Verse n-13 durchgerungen, 
so ware ein Ruckfall in die ausserste Verzweiflung, wie er 14-18 
erfolgt, psychologisch unerklarlich und Ewald bethatigte sein feines 
Gefuhl, wenn er desshalb v. 14-18 vor 7-13 stellte. Dagegen als 
Fortsetzung und Steigerung von 7-10 sind 14-18 durchaus begreiflich 
und wohl an ihrem Platze, einerlei ob dieser Zusammenhang ur- 
spriinglich, oder lediglich Redactionsarbeit ist." 



PART II 



CHAPTER I 

INTRODUCTORY 

Jeremiah's record in the confessions of the divine 
power which controlled his inner life leads naturally 
to the question of prophetic inspiration, a question 
which is obviously of central importance in any ex- 
position of the faith of the prophets. For reasons, 
however, which will become presently apparent we 
shall preface our discussion of this question with the 
proof of the statement made in the General Survey 
that Jeremiah did not know how to write. 

JEREMIAH COULD NOT WRITE 

The question, how and why Jeremiah dictated his 
prophecies to Baruch, has caused a good deal of specu- 
lation among biblical scholars. The only adequate 
explanation is a very simple one, so simple in fact, that 
one must wonder that it did not suggest itself to 
modern scholars. 

It is clear to my mind that Jeremiah dictated his 
prophecies to Baruch because he himself was unable 
to put them down in writing. Conclusive proof of 
this must be seen in the fact that, when Jeremiah 
arranged for the second collection of his prophecies, 
he again dictated them to Baruch, as XXXVI, 32 
expressly states. If only the first collection came in 
question, one might argue that the fact that Baruch 

*33 



134 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

had to read the prophecies made it seem expedient 
that he write them down in his own hand, but no 
such reason — nor for that matter any other plausible 
reason — can be advanced to explain why Jeremiah 
dictated his prophecies to Baruch the second time, 
if he himself knew how to write. The luxury of 
a private secretary for a man in Jeremiah's walk 
of life was unknown in those days; moreover, in 
his enforced confinement, lasting over ten years, 
Jeremiah had all the leisure necessary to attend to the 
writing down of his prophecies himself, even granted 
that this would have been a most laborious under- 
taking for him. 

waaekhtobh bassephaer of XXXII, 10 cannot be 
taken as a proof to the contrary, any more than w e - 
khathabhtd and ukhthobh c alee ha (LXX) 'aeth kol hadd e - 
bharlm in vv. 2 and 28 respectively of Chap. XXXVI. 
As in the latter case, where the account that follows 
of the carrying out of God's behest leaves no doubt 
that w e khathabhta and kHhobh are to be understood 
in the sense, "have all the words written in it," so 
must waaekhtobh bassephaer correspondingly mean, "I 
had it recorded," for the reason that in Jeremiah's 
time, precisely as to-day, the transference of real 
property, in order to be valid, had to be duly recorded 
by a qualified official. So in XXXVI, 29, maddu' a 
kathabhta means "Why didst thou have . . . written 
down?" Usage evidently sanctioned the inexactness 
of all these expressions, even as it does in similar ex- 
pressions to-day. We are accustomed to say, "we 
filed suit," or "we deeded our property," or "the firm 
replied," although in each case the action is accom- 
plished through an intermediary. 

The scholars who assume that, in dictating his 



INTRODUCTORY 135 

prophecies to Baruch, Jeremiah must have made use 
of more or less copious memoranda, which he had made 
at some previous time, 1 overlook the fact that there 
would be nothing surprising, nor in any way excep- 
tional for those times, about Jeremiah's retaining his 
prophecies in his memory, and being able to reproduce 
them accurately at any time he chose. Both in 
ancient and mediaeval times, it was not uncommon 
for poets to produce and to recite works of great 
length without resort to writing. It is well known 
that Wolfram von Eschenbach, the great German 
poet of the Middle Ages, could neither read nor write, 
yet he produced works of great length, and, in accord- 
ance with the practice of the time, he, no doubt, recited 
them on different occasions. How common illiteracy 
was among the poets of that age may be gleaned from 
Hartman von Aue's boast that he could "read in 
books." In ancient India the production and preser- 
vation of all literature continued for upwards of two 
thousand years independent of writing and manu- 
scripts. 2 

The theory advanced by Stade in explanation of 

1 See Cornill, op. ciL, ad loc. and Einleitung, p. XXXIX; Duhm, 
op. ciL, ad loc. and on Chap. XVII, 9, 10; Giesebrecht, op. cii, ad loc; 
Erbt, op. ciL, p. 7, n. 1. 

2 An interesting case of a highly developed memory in modern 
times, though under somewhat primitive conditions, came to my 
notice about twelve years ago. Happening to be in Sarnia, Ontario, 
I drove with a friend to the near-by Indian Reserve, Moretown, to 
attend the Sunday-morning service. The service was conducted in 
the Indian tongue, with the exception of the sermon, which was 
delivered by a visiting Methodist minister (a white man). After 
speaking for about fifteen minutes, the minister gave place to an 
Indian interpreter, who repeated what he had said in Indian. Then 
the minister continued for another fifteen minutes and was followed 
again by the interpreter. I noticed that the Indian spoke for about 



136 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

the question, "Why Jeremiah dictates his prophecies 
to Baruch," proceeds from a wrong premise. Stade 
remarks: "Er tut es, well es der Wiederholung der 
Ekstase bedurfte, um die fruher gehaltenen Reden zu 
reproduciren, und well man im Zustande der Inspiration 
redet aber nicht schreibt." 1 ("He did so because the 
repetition of the ecstasy was necessary for the repro- 
duction of the sermons delivered on former occasions, 
and because one can speak but not write in the state 
of inspiration.") 

The error involved in this reasoning is one very 
commonly met with in books on prophecy. It consists 
in the failure to differentiate between inspiration and 
ecstasy or mantic possession, that is between the 
revelation of spiritual prophecy and the divination 
peculiar to both the older and the contemporary 
official prophecy. This failure, together with the 
other serious mistake, referred to above, 2 of believing 
the literary prophets to have been "the leaders and 

the same length of time as the minister, but that his delivery was 
marked by much greater fervor. Being greatly interested in the case, 
I made careful enquiry regarding the Indian and his rendering of the 
sermon. I learned, (1) that he was a man with an easy command of 
English, but with only the most elementary schooling; (2) that he 
had not previously heard the sermon he translated; (3) that he had 
reproduced the sermon in Indian practically verbatim, any changes 
that could be pointed out being of a trifling and immaterial nature. 
Of this last fact I received assurance from several persons who were 
conversant with both tongues, among others from the chief, who had 
some white blood in his veins, and who possessed both intelligence 
and school training far above the average. It was further claimed 
that the interpreter could even repeat a sermon with exactness several 
months after hearing it. 

1 See ZATW., XXIII (1903), 157s., 159; "Biblische Theologie des 
Alten Testaments," p. 208. 

2 See supra, pp. 6if., 78. 



INTRODUCTORY 137 

advisers of king and people in important political 
and religious matters," * even as were the older 
prophets, has caused confusion all along the line, and 
is particularly apparent in all the attempts which 
have been made of recent years to show that there is 
nothing unique, nothing original even, about Israelit- 
ish prophecy or, for that matter, about the religious 
development of Israel in general. 

To bring out the radical difference between pro- 
phetic ecstasy and prophetic inspiration, it will be 
necessary to enter with some detail into a discussion of 
the nature and origin of each of these phenomena. 
For only in this way is it possible to proceed with 
certainty and to determine whether the ardent belief 
of the prophets in their divine call, with the burning 
testimony to which this belief drove them, was really 
nothing more, as has often been maintained, than 
delirium, enthusiastic self-delusion, if not indeed mere 
vague pretension, or whether it was not rather the 
outcome of a new realization of the relation between 
God and man, and, as such, constituted religious pro- 
gress of a truly epoch-making order. 

^o expressed by Kittel, "Geschichte des Volkes Israel," 1 II, p. 
438. 



CHAPTER II 

INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 
OR POSSESSION 

The inspiration of the great literary prophets has 
nothing in common with the ecstasy of the prophets 
of the older type — a state which could be artificially 
produced at will. It is altogether distinct from 
prophetic possession, as understood by the ancients 
and defined by Plato and Philo, who held that in order 
to become the medium of divine revelation, the mind 
must be in a state of absolute passivity. 1 Naturally, 
utterances of persons thus possessed are both invol- 
untary and unconscious. The utterances of the liter- 
ary prophets, on the other hand, proceed from an 
apperceptive state of mind. As Robertson Smith 
expresses it, "He (Jehovah) speaks to His prophets, 
not in magical processes or through the visions of poor 
phrenetics, but by a clear intelligible word addressed 
to the intellect and the heart. The characteristic of 
the true prophet is that he retains his consciousness 
and self-control under revelation." 2 

1 "Inspired and true divination," says Plato, "is not attained to 
by any one when in his full senses, but only when the power of thought 
is fettered by sleep or disease or some paroxysm of frenzy " (Timceus, 
cap. XXXII, p. 71, D). "Plato's theory was applied to the prophets 
by Philo, the Jewish Platonist, who describes the prophetic state as an 
ecstasy in which the human vovs disappears to make way for the 
divine Spirit" (Quis rerum div. heres, § 53, ed. Richter, III, 58; De 
Spec. Leg., § 8, Richter, V, 122).— See W. Robertson Smith, "The Old 
Testament in the Jewish Church," p. 286, n. 1. 

2 Op. cit., p. 289. 

138 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 139 

Nor are the visions of the literary prophets in any 
way akin to the ecstatic visions and dreams of the 
diviner. There are two distinct kinds of visions met 
with in literary prophecy. The first comprises such 
visions as those related in Is. VI, Jer. I, 1-10, 15-19, 
and also Am. VTI, 7-9, in which the prophets tell of 
the event from which they date their call to prophecy. 
As this event is always in the nature of a spiritual 
experience, and as spiritual experiences are something 
which cannot be directly expressed, the prophets re- 
sort of necessity to an indirect method of description. 
To them has come a divine moment when, as by a 
flash of light, they have beheld the mystery of life 
revealed, when, as by a sudden intuition, they have 
pierced to the reality of things, when their individual 
mind has stood face to face with the infinite, universal 
mind and realized itself the chosen instrument of God's 
purpose. This moment marks a new epoch in their 
existence; never again can their life be just as it has 
been. From this moment they are pledged to God's 
purpose — they have found their mission. Such 
spiritual experiences are not the fruit of an inert, 
passive mind, but of a mind consciously sounding the 
very depths of its being, a mind awakened to the 
fullest realization of its moral and spiritual constitu- 
tion. 

Such experiences, moreover, are invariably accom- 
panied in the human consciousness by the emotion of 
the sublime. The mind is awed by the sudden sense 
of the infinite, of the newly revealed universe aglow 
with "the splendor of God," and by the perception 
withal that it is but "the hem of God's garment" of 
which the inner eye has caught a fleeting vision. 1 

1 See Is. VI, 1-4. 



140 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

The mystic agitation attending every influx of the 
infinite into the finite mind, attending every new 
flash of truth upon the soul, is nowhere so adequately 
described as in that memorable account of revelation 
given in Job IV, 12-16: 

" To me a message stole, 

My ear caught a whisper thereof; 

In the reveries of night- visions 

When deep sleep lay on men, 

Fear seized me and trembling, 

Filled all my bones with dread; 

A spirit flitted past my face, 

The hair of my flesh stood on end: 

It stood [there], but I could not 

discern the countenance thereof, 

A form before my eyes : — 

A faint whisper did I perceive." 

These lines from Job suggest the similar expressions 
from various modern poets on this point. Schiller's 
"Die Macht des Gesanges" contains the following 
description: 

"Ein Regenstrom aus Felsenrissen, 
Er kommt mit Donners Ungestiim, 
Bergtriimmer folgen seinen Gussen, 
Und Eichen stiirzen unter ihm; 
Erstaunt, mit wollustvollem Grauen, 
Hort ihn der Wanderer und lauscht, 
Er hort die Flut vom Felsen brausen, 
Doch weiss er nicht, woher sie rauscht: 
So stromen des Gesanges Wellen 
Hervor aus nie entdeckten Quellen." 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 141 

Hamilton Wright Mabie says in his essay, "The 
Infinite in the Finite:" "In quiet hours, when what 
is called inspiration breathes on a human spirit, and 
that spirit vibrates into a music unheard before, the 
finite and the infinite blend for a moment, and a fresh 
wave of life flows into the sphere of mortal striving 
and seeking." Then he cites the personal testimony 
of a poet: 

"Writing poetry ... is like wading into the sea. 
You are chilled and reluctant, and tempted to turn 
back; and while you stand hesitating a great wave 
rolls in from the infinite and bears you out — you know 
not how nor whither." 1 

But possibly of the moderns, Wordsworth in " Tin- 
tern Abbey" has come nearer than any other to an 
adequate expression of the emotions attending the 
sudden flash of truth upon the soul, the sudden per- 
ception of the invisible behind the visible, of the 
spiritual back of the material world: 

" . . . that blessed mood, 
In which the burthen of the mystery, 
In which the heavy and the weary weight 
Of all this unintelligible world, 
Is lightened: — that serene and blessed mood, 
In which the affections gently lead us on, — 
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame 
And even the motion of our human blood 
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep 
In body, and become a living soul: 
While with an eye made quiet by the power 
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, 
We see into the life of things. 



1 "The Great Word," p. 1751. 



142 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

These modern analogies, to my mind, bring out 
clearly the serious misapprehension of spiritual proph- 
ecy involved in the views of those scholars who con- 
sider the visions related in Is. VI, and Jer. I, i-io, 
15-19 and the ecstasies or trance of the diviner psychi- 
cally related phenomena. (See infra, p. 161, n. 2.) 

The second class of visions met with in literary 
prophecy comprises such visions as Am. VIII, 1-2, 
IX, 1-4, 1 Jer. I, 11-14, which also have been thought 
by Stade 2 and other scholars to be of an ecstatic 
nature. There is, however, nothing pathological in 
the origin of these visions. They may readily be 
explained on a psychological basis. They reveal the 
prophet's state of mind. He is haunted by thoughts 
of the judgment he believes impending, filled with 
pictures of the coming ruin. Everything he sees 
serves but to recall that one momentous fact — he can- 
not get away from it. A basket of ripe fruit reminds 
Amos of his people ripe for judgment. The almond 
shrub budding into life in the spring speaks to Jere- 
miah of the certainty and the speed of the judgment 
which his people's wickedness has entailed on them. 

Actions, however, like those related in Hos. I, 4, 6, 9, 
Is. VIII, 3, XX, 2 f., Jer. XIII, iff., XXVII, iff., to 
which Stade and others also refer in proof that ec- 
stasy is met with among the literary prophets, just as 
among the older prophets, 3 are not the outcome of a 

1 Am. VII, 1-6 do not relate mere experiences in the prophet's 
soul, as Stade believes (see "Biblische Theologie des Alt. Test.," 
p. 126, § 61, and p. 206), but external events, visitations by locusts 
and drought, which had happened at some time in the past. See 
infra Part III, Chap. IV, § 4. 

*Op.ciL,ib. 

3 See ZATW., ib., p. 161, and "Biblische Theologie des Alt. Test.," 
p. 206. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 143 

state of ecstasy. They are voluntary acts intended to 
prognosticate or prefigure certain future events which 
the prophet felt sure were bound to happen. 

The literary prophets themselves took pains to 
disclaim any connection between their revelation and 
the divination of the official prophets of their day, or 
the divination of the recognized prophetic guilds — 
which was the same divination as was practised by 
the older prophets. 1 

Thus Amos, in his reply to Amaziah (VII, i4f.), 2 
protests emphatically against Amaziah's confusing 
him with the established prophetic guilds, with whom 
prophesying was a profession and a business, and 
points to his divine call, to God's revelation within 
him which has driven him to prophesy, as the dis- 
tinguishing mark between him and the professional 
prophets, with whom Amaziah is familiar. 

Or take Micah, III, 5-8. Here Micah describes the 
professional prophets of his time, who through visions 
and divination seek to secure the revelation of God, 
and who, though ostensibly the spiritual leaders of the 
people, in reality lead them astray and work their 
downfall. He drastically characterizes their insincer- 
ity, their utter lack of moral convictions and princi- 
ples. Then he goes on to declare that he, on the con- 
trary, is stirred by the spirit of God, by the promptings 
of his own conscience, and that, consequently, he has 
the courage and the strength to denounce the wicked- 
ness of his people: 

1 It is recorded of Samuel and the bands of prophets directed by 
him, and also of Elisha, that they had recourse to divination (cf. 
I Sam. IX, 6, 20, X, 5 f.,- ioff., XIX, 20-24, II Ki. Ill, 15). 

2 See supra, p. 8. 



144 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

" But I am filled with might, 
in that I am roused by the spirit of God, 
the spirit of justice and of moral power, 
so that I can tell Jacob his transgression, 
Israel his sin." 1 

But the most important passage bearing on this 
point is Jer. XXIII, 9-40, where prophetic inspiration 
is clearly defined, and the radical difference between 
it and divination exhaustively set forth. In the open- 
ing part of this sermon Jeremiah scores the recognized 
prophets of the day for their immoral lives and their 
evil influence on the people. He denounces them as 
false prophets, who have not stood in God's council, 
who but preach delusions spun out of their own brains, 
prophesying prosperity to a country ripe for judgment: 

"Thus saith the Lord Sabaoth, 

hearken not to the words of the prophets that prophesy 

unto you — 
They do but delude you, they speak visions 
which spring from their own hearts, and not from the 

mouth of God. 

1 Although this verse is rendered accurately enough in the King 
James' Version, it is thought by most modern exegetes to require 
emendation — some scholars omit ko^h 'aeth, others 'aeth ru a h jahwa. 
There is, however, nothing wrong with the verse. In the first place, 
malethl forms a sort of zeugma, the objects, ' aeth ru a h jahwa umispat 
ug e bhura, altering its meaning, "am filled," slightly to "am roused," 
"am moved;" with a similar meaning male occurs Eccl. VIII, 11, 
". . . the heart of man is prompted to do evil," and again Est. 
VII, 5, ". . . whose heart prompts him to do so." Secondly, malethl 
koah, "I am filled with might," and 'aeth ru^h jahwa umispat ug e bhilra, 
"am moved by the spirit of God, the spirit of justice and of moral 
power," are in the relation of effect and cause, which explains the 
introduction of the latter with 'aeth. Thirdly, umispat ug e bhurd are 
other genitives depending on ru a h and explicative of ru a h jahwa. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 145 

They assert positively to those that scorn me, 

the Lord hath spoken, ye shall have prosperity, 

and to those that follow wilfully the inclinations of 

their hearts 
they speak, no evil shall befall you" (vv. 16, 17). 

The mark of the true prophet, on the other hand, is 
that he has held converse with God, has become 
possessed of His purpose, and must needs proclaim it: 

"For he who hath held converse with God, 
hath perceived and heard His word, 
he who hath hearkened to His word, 
must proclaim it" 1 (v. 18). 

It follows by implication that this converse with 
God is of a moral nature, that is to say, is through 
the medium of the moral consciousness. The false 
prophets, who have set law and morality at defiance, 
are shut out from God's council. Had they held con- 
verse with God, had they entered into His purpose, 
like the true prophets, they would know that the judg- 
ment was imminent, and would of necessity preach 
to the people not prosperity but repentance: 2 

"If they had held converse with me, 

they would have to proclaim my words to my people, 

1 Instead of wajjisma, the jussive Hiph'il, wajjasma 1 , is to be read, 
in accordance with jasml'il of the parallel verse 22; the jussive with 
wa consecutive here expresses consequence, as, e. g., wajjamoth, 
XXXVIII, 9. The object d e bharo of the preceding verb is to be con- 
strued also with wajjasma . 

2 Jeremiah's mode of thought here is in accord with his reasoning, 
IX, 23 and XXII, 15b, 16; in the former passage he brings out the 
idea that to know or experience God is to realize that God controls 
the universe in accordance with the moral law, and in the latter, that 
to know God means to live in conformity with the moral law. 



146 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

and make them return from their evil way and their 
wicked doings" (v. 22). 

But how is it possible at all for a man to hold con- 
verse with God? In verses 23 and 24 Jeremiah gives 
the answer to this very natural question: because God 
is ever present in man. Not v. 23 as it stands, but 
what we must conclude was the original form of v. 23. 
The original text, as preserved in the reading of the 
LXX, Oebs ijji^cov iyd) elfii ical ov)(l #eo? iroppcaOev, 
must have read ,ae lohe miqqarobh, or with different 
word-division/ a6 lohlm qarobh ,a nl w e lo ,ae lohe mera- 
hoq: 

"I am a present God, and not a far-off God." * 

The interrogative particle with which the verse now 
opens was added later. That the reading of the LXX 
in this case is the correct one, cannot be doubted in 
view of the fact that v. 24 is the logical and coherent 
enlargement of the thought thus expressed: 

"If a man hides in secret, do I not see him? saith 

the Lord. 
Verily, I fill heaven and earth, saith the Lord." 

Further proof lies in the fact that v. 23, so read, with 
v. 24, establishes a perfect sequence of thought with 
the preceding vv. 18-22, a sequence which is alto- 
gether lacking when the Masoretic text of v. 23 is 
accepted. 

It is significant that w. 23 and 24 express just the 
opposite view to that met with in I Ki. VIII, 27 
(II Chron. VI, 18): "But doth God indeed dwell with 

1 See Giesebrecht, op. cit., ad loc, and Rothstein in Kittel, "Biblia 
Hebraica," ad loc. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 147 

man ('aeth hcfadani) 1 on earth? Behold, heaven and 
the heaven of heavens cannot contain Thee." The 
latter reflects the belief which prevailed in Jeremiah's 
own age, and which became more fully developed and 
dogmatized in later Judaism — the belief that God was 
a far-off God, a transcendent God, enthroned in the 
remote heavens. 

But the prophets, in particular Jeremiah, knew that 
God was present in man — had they not experienced 
the power of the divine within themselves? — and it is 
out of the fulness of this experience that Jeremiah 
declares that God is not a far-off God, but a near God 
rilling heaven and earth, an immanent God, that is; 
a God enthroned in the universe, and present in every 
human heart. 

It is important to note that the author of Ps. 
LXXIII uses very similar phraseology in express- 
ing his realization of the presence of God in man's 
heart: wa' a nt qirbhath iae lohim It tobh, "But the pres- 
ence" — literally " nearness" — "of God is my very 2 
happiness" (v. 28). That Jer. verse 23 became 
changed to an interrogative sentence was, no doubt, 
as Giesebrecht concludes, for dogmatic reasons. Later 
ages, failing to see the real meaning of the verse, evi- 
dently read in it a denial of the omnipresence of God. 

Verses 25ff. are as logically connected with vv. 23L 
as the latter are with w. 18-22. Having established 
the basic fact that God is immanent, is a living reality 

1 The LXX read 'aeth ha'adam also I Ki. VIII, 27, from which 
Benzinger (contrary to Kittel) rightly concluded (in "Die Biicher der 
Konige" and "Die Bucher der Chronik") that the original text read 
'aeth ha 'adam in Kings as well as in Chronicles. Its omission in the 
Masoretic text of Kings may have been accidental, but it is very 
probable that it was left out for dogmatic reasons. 

3 The emphatic force of the appositive, ' a nl, may thus be expressed. 



148 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

in man, Jeremiah goes on to show how, in contrast to 
the mistaken notion of revelation and its manifesta- 
tions entertained by his contemporaries, true revela- 
tion is the manifestation of the indwelling God in the 
human heart. 

The people, by reason of their conception of God as 
a far-off God, looked upon the divine Spirit as an alien 
force entering the mind of man from without, sub- 
duing his rational faculties, and making him a passive 
organ of revelation. The proper channels of divine 
revelation were thought to be dreams, ecstatic visions 
or religious frenzy, as the state of possession naturally 
demanded an unconscious or semiconscious frame of 
mind. Accordingly, prophecy for those ages did not 
consist in clear, connected thought, but rather in 
muttered utterances — often equivocal if not altogether 
obscure — or in such rapturous, unintelligible speech 
as speaking with tongues. Whenever, as in great 
crises, prophets of this type acted in a body, the frenzy 
would communicate itself from one to another, and, 
to a man, they would frantically repeat the oracle 
uttered by the leader, as in the case of the four hun- 
dred prophets before Ahab, led by Zedekiah b. Ka- 
naanah (I Ki. XXII, 6ff.). "Stealing my words from 
one another" (v. 30) is the way Jeremiah puts it — for 
to him prophesying was a matter of direct, personal 
inspiration. By wajjin^mu n e 'uni (v. 31) he refers 
explicitly to the muttered, obscure oracles, which 
were evidently in his mind also in vv. 33$., where he 
contrasts the people's solicitous inquiry as to the 
meaning of the massa, "oracle," with the direct and 
immediate revelation (ma 'and jahwce uma dibbaer 
jahwcB; see infra) of the living God — living, i. e., 
present, indwelling in man's heart. By halloq e him 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 149 

l e sonant (v. 31), it is reasonably certain, the speaking 
with tongues is meant. The reading of the LXX 
NAQ points to this: tovs ifcfidWovTas irpo^rjTeta^ 
( — eiav A) y\a)cro-r)<; ( — o~arj A). ifc/3a\\. , evidently, 
has here the meaning " utter," a meaning which laqah 
may readily be assumed to have, in view of the fact 
that the verbal abstract, laeqah, may mean " speech" 
(cf. Prov. VII, 21). The dative instrumentalis jXcocto-t] 1 
of A, which no doubt is the original reading, fur- 
nishes the clue to the grammatical force of l e sonam, 
showing that it is an accusative of specification. 

With all these irrational, pathological phenomena, 
believed by his contemporaries to be manifestations 
of revelation, Jeremiah contrasts the evidences and 
workings of true revelation. Inspiration, he tells 
them, is an elemental force which acts within the 
human heart, and with which their imaginary posses- 
sion by the Spirit has no more in common than " chaff 
has with grain": 

"Is not my word like fire, saith the Lord, 
like a hammer that splits the rock asunder?" fw. 28, 
29). 

Note here the resemblance to XX, 9, where he de- 
scribes his prophetic inspiration as a raging fire shut 
up in his bosom, which he has striven vainly to with- 
stand. This divine force, this inward fire, cannot be 
withstood, he says here, any more than the persistent 
force of the hammer can be resisted by the solid rock. 

1 The use of the dat. sing, (and not dat. plur. as in Acts II, 4, X, 46, 
XIX, 6) in referring to this phenomenon agrees with the expression 
yXwa-a-p Xakelv, of I Cor. XIV, 2, 4, 131., 18, 27, the New Testament 
source which is of supreme importance for our knowledge of this phe- 
nomenon. As to eKfidWtLV, absol., " to speak," cf. Diog. L. ix, 7. 



150 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

In the light of vv. 28, 29 the import of vv. 35-37 in 
general, as of ma 'andjahwce uma dibbaerjahwcE, " What 
doth God respond and what doth God speak?" in 
particular, is clear. Not through such delusive and 
artificial media as dreams and frenzy, not through 
a perverted imagination, the prophet means to say, 
does God reveal Himself, but immediately and directly 
to the inner perception of man. Neither does He 
speak by strange, oracular utterances, but by a clear 
word, intelligible to all. Equally apparent is the 
significance of v. 37, " Thus shall you speak to the 
prophet, What doth God answer thee? ( l anakh j ahwce) 
and what doth God speak? (dibbaer jahwce)" This 
verse has generally been thought to be a meaningless 
repetition of v. 35 by a later interpolater, but the 
exegetes have overlooked a very vital difference 
between the two, viz., that instead of "thus shall ye 
speak to one another" (v. 35), v. 37 has "thus shall 
you 1 speak to the prophet." It is this variation that 
gives point to the repetition, for it brings out the fact 
which Jeremiah would impress upon his hearers, that 
God reveals himself not to the prophet alone but to 
every individual — reveals himself immediately and 
unmistakably in the moral consciousness of each. 

Thus reduced to its essence, divested of all the 
miraculous features and supernatural accompani- 
ments which the primitive mind had associated with 
it, prophetic inspiration seems a very simple matter 
indeed. Yet this view of inspiration was the view, not 
of Jeremiah alone, but of all the great literary proph- 
ets, only Jeremiah being the most subjective and ana- 
lytic of them, he naturally gave it the most reasoned 

1 The 2d sing, thdmar is here translated " you . . ." in order 
to better express its impersonal force. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 151 

out and definite expression. Amos, Hosea, Micah, 
Isaiah, Deutero-Isaiah, every one of them, there is evi- 
dence, when he spoke of revelation, meant the divine 
force or voice which he felt within his heart. None of 
them claimed anything else than the impulsion of this 
force, the authority of this voice. It was so simple, so 
elemental, so self-evident to them, that any particular 
explanation or demonstration would have seemed 
superfluous. They all refer to their inspiration in the 
most matter of fact way — God spoke to them. The 
earnest man of to-day might ponder over the initial 
mystery of man's moral consciousness — not so the 
prophets. For them it was no mystery, it was an a 
priori fact, the manifestation of God. It was the 
source from which they derived the moral vision and 
the moral energy, which constituted their prophetic gift. 
To any occult supernatural power the prophets laid 
no claim ; against the morbid or artificial vision of the 
diviner, the phrenetic energy of the sooth-sayer they 
vented their loathing and reproach; they repudiated 
with scorn the idea that they had anything in common 
with the professional prophets, never failing to bring 
out the distinction between their own prophecies and 
vaticination. Thus, however authoritatively they 
declared that the judgment was near at hand, they 
openly admitted the limitation of their human insight 
in regard to the attendant circumstances, the How and 
the When, and the other details of the crisis. Thus, 
e. g.j at the time of the civil war after the death of 
Jeroboam II, when the two contending factions into 
which the country was divided, appealed to Assyria 
and Egypt, respectively, for help, Hosea predicted 
that this foolish policy would prove the means by 
which God would work their certain ruin (Hos. VII, 



152 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

i if.), but he left it open whether it would be through 
Assyria or through Egypt that their downfall would 
be brought about (cf. ib., IX, 3, XI, 5, and also VIII, 
13, the latter as read by the LXX). The fact that 
they erred again and again in the matter of details was 
altogether irrelevant to them — their convictions re- 
mained unaltered, their assurance of divine revelation 
as abiding as ever. Hosea, in the first period of his 
activity, predicted that the fall of Israel and the over- 
throw of the dynasty of Jehu would occur simulta- 
neously (Hos. I, 4f.), and though the course of history 
disproved his expectations, he persisted, nevertheless, 
in his conviction that the nation was doomed. Sim- 
ilarly, Isaiah, when subsequent events failed to verify 
his prophecy at the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic 
campaign, that in a year's time Damascus and 
Ephraim, and Judah as well, would be conquered by 
Assyria (Is. VII, 14-VIII, 8), continued to declare 
that the judgment was inevitable. 

Equally if not more significant is the fact that the 
prophets preserved unchanged even those prophecies 
which contained erroneous forecasts, that is, fore- 
casts which had been disproved by the actual outcome 
of events. The fact is, the various details of time, 
place, and circumstance possessed no importance in 
their eyes. Such specifications were the result of their 
human reasoning, and as such were non-essentials. 
If their reason erred in these matters, if their judgment 
failed to estimate the political situation correctly, this 
in no wise invalidated the great basic truths or prin- 
ciples of which they were cognizant through their 
moral consciousness, and which, constituting their 
revelation from God, formed the centre and essence of 
their prophecy. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 153 

This explains, in the case of Isaiah, how it came 
that, although practically all his political prognostica- 
tions in his prophecies of the time of the Syro- 
Ephraimitic campaign turned out to be mistaken, he 
not only preserved these prophecies intact, but even 
referred to them in his later prophecies of the years 
704-701 as the revelation of God (see Is. XXX, 15). 1 
And so, too, it came that when Jeremiah, after twenty- 
three years of activity, committed his prophecies to 
writing, he included without alteration or adaptation 
his prophecies of the time of the Scythian invasion, 
although his forecast of events in these had in no wise 
been verified. 

It mattered not to the prophets that their con- 
temporaries pointed tauntingly to these unfulfilled 
prophecies, and sought to make light of their prophetic 
gifts (see Is. V, 19, Jer. XVII, 15). They had the 
serene assurance that the essence of their prophecies, 
the moral truths underlying and animating them, 
remained forever secure and unassailable. Whether 
destruction came from Assyria or from Egypt, from 
the Scythians or the Chaldaeans, whether it came 
sooner or later, were after all very minor considera- 
tions, 2 in no wise affecting the vital, fundamental facts 
that God was a God of eternal righteousness, that what 
He required of man was to know Him and to conform 
to His moral law, that Israel, utterly failing in these 
respects, was doomed to destruction, but that this 

1 See supra, p. 76, and infra, pp. 266, 269. 

2 This point has been correctly referred to by W. Robertson Smith, 
"The Prophets of Israel," p. 268, and by Smend, "Lehrbuch der 
Alttestamentlichen Religionsgeschichte," p. 192. Cornill's explana- 
tion of the matter {op. cit., p. 86) is altogether erroneous, the premise 
from which it proceeds being in reality nothing else than Plato's 
and Philo's view of inspiration. 



154 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

destruction was to be simply God's means of effecting 
its spiritual regeneration, and of establishing His own 
dominion throughout the world. 

It is interesting to note that the great prophet of the 
exile, Deutero-Isaiah, who lived amid entirely different 
conditions, and who, accordingly, preached not retri- 
bution and doom, but pardon and redemption, held 
essentially the same view of inspiration as his great 
predecessors. The very words with which he opens 
his prophecies, 1 " Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, 
speaks evermore distinctly your God," show that he 
had the same triumphant faith and spiritual vision as 
they, since in the convulsions of the time, which, for 
his contemporaries, were exactly what they seemed, he 
beheld the manifestation of the divine Spirit — heard 
the voice of God. jomar has not the force of a future 
tense, but is imperfect of progressive duration, its 
meaning being that God is speaking through con- 
temporaneous events, viz., through the rise and the 
growing victories of Cyrus. But this verse, as also 
v. 2a, " Speak ye words of cheer to Jerusalem and 
proclaim to her," shows that Deutero-Isaiah regarded 
God's call as addressed, not to himself alone, but to 
all men — all, that is, that had ears to hear. This is 
shown by the plurals, " Comfort ye, comfort ye," and 
" Speak ye . . . and proclaim." In the following w. 
3-8 the basic thought is brought out that back of the 
visible perishable things of this world, there is an 
invisible, eternal world, viz., God and His universal 
plan of salvation. To those, therefore, who have the 
spiritual capacity to discern the eternal truths clothed 
in the passing events, to those is God's call in the 
opening lines addressed. In this way Deutero- 
ils. XL-LV. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 155 

Isaiah, although he makes use of different figures, 
brings out fundamentally the same idea of revela- 
tion that Jeremiah expresses in the conclusion of his 
exposition of revelation. 

This conception of inspiration was, in fact, the 
foundation upon which all the great prophets builded. 
It was, of course, too profound in its simplicity to 
be within the comprehension of the masses, which 
Deutero-Isaiah describes as "blind though they have 
eyes, deaf though they have ears," * but by the 
prophets it was so acutely realized that it was, so to 
speak, a governing principle with them. It is back 
of all their utterances, it is the sine qua non of their 
activity. It accounts for the spiritual element which 
entered so predominatingly into the prophetic move- 
ment inaugurated by Amos, and which characterizes it 
from the start as something radically and essentially 
different from the religious evolution that preceded it. 
This point cannot be stated too emphatically. Liter- 
ary prophecy is not the natural, lineal growth out of 
the older religious beliefs and usages, but, by virtue 
of the prophetic conception of revelation at the root 
of it, is, clearly, the direct fruit of the autonomous 
human spirit, which, freed from the fettering notions 
and traditions of the past, has come to a knowledge 
of itself and to a realization of the purpose and mean- 
ing of life — in other words, literary prophecy must 
be accounted the spontaneous creation of genius, the 
immediate product of the intuitive human mind. 

The religious advance marked by such a conception 

1 Is. XLIII, 8. This was a favorite figure of the prophets in 
referring to the people's lack of spiritual comprehension; cf. further 
Is. XLII, 7, i8f., XXXII, 3, Jer. V, 21, Ezek. XII, 2, and also 
Deut. XXIX, 3. 



156 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of inspiration must seem all the more marvellous when 
it is remembered that even Plato, a couple of cen- 
turies later, had not outgrown the primitive, pagan 
notion of revelation, but conceived of it as a neces- 
sarily irrational and subnormal phenomenon. 1 

For the first time in the history of the human race 
the essential truth was distinctly realized and un- 
equivocally expressed, that the relation of man to God 
is a moral relation, that it is in the conscience of 
man that God speaks, that man's moral convictions 
and promptings are the very voice of God. 

From this realization man's religious obligation 
followed clearly — the obligation to establish and sus- 
tain fellowship with God, not by means of external 
agencies, rites or other media, but by living up to 
the divine promptings within himself, by consciously 
aspiring after, and shaping his life and conduct in 
accordance with the absolute perfection of God. Thus 
righteousness was realized to be the link binding earth 
to heaven, and morality became henceforward the 
object and end of religion, moral perfection the 
religious ideal. The picture of the ideal future drawn 
by Deutero-Isaiah and also by the Psalmist, when 
righteousness shall descend from heaven to earth, 
and heaven and earth unite, so to speak, for the 
realization of the perfect order of things (Is. XLV, 8, 
Ps. LXXXV, 12), was substantially the vision which 
inspired the literary prophets from the very start. 

It follows from the foregoing discussion that, 
psychologically considered, prophetic inspiration is not 
materially different from the furor poeticus of the 
master-poet or artist. Both are phases of human 
genius — prophetic inspiration being human genius 
1 See supra, p. 138, n. 1. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 157 

acting in the most vital sphere of human interest, the 
interpretation of human life and its relation to the 
universal life. Not that such an explanation makes 
spiritual prophecy a whit the less mysterious, or more 
commonplace, for in its last analysis human genius 
is inexplicable, just as are the ultimate relations of all 
things, and as is, above all, the conscious, moral life 
of the soul. 

And nowhere is the inexplicableness of human genius 
so strikingly exhibited as in the case of the great 
prophets of Israel. Though the prophets, while 
towering far above the level of their race, were yet an 
integral, inseparable part of it, though no external 
influences of whatever sort had conduced to make 
them what they were, but rather the accumulated ex- 
perience of the race, from which they derived the ele- 
ments of their culture, and from which each assimi- 
lated those elements most vitally related to his own 
being, — though, in this sense, the harvest wrought by 
each might be traced back to seeds or roots lying deep 
in the history of the race, yet in each case fruition 
was dependent on the fructifying, vitalizing principle 
which sprang, as it were, from the prophet's own in- 
dividuality, and whose existence was, as it ever is, 
independent of race, time, and other circumstances 
within human ken. 

Unless the action of this mysterious principle, which 
is nothing else than what we call genius, be kept in 
mind, it is impossible to account for the inception of 
prophetic religion just at that period of Israel's history 
when it occurred. Between the religious beliefs which 
prevailed in Israel up to that time and the religious 
views of the prophets there is a gap which cannot be 
bridged by any logical process. The idea of God which 



158 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

held sway in Israel at the time of Amos' appearance 
did not even remotely approximate a monistic concep- 
tion of the universe. The people believed in one God, 
the God of Israel, but granted the existence of other 
gods for other nations. A divine unity did not exist 
for them, and still less did such a conception exist for 
the surrounding Oriental nations, who believed in a 
plurality of divine forces in competition, if not in open 
conflict with one another. 1 Indeed, the spectacle 

1 There have been efforts of recent years to show that there was an 
"Old-Oriental Monotheism," antedating the prophetic movement by- 
many centuries; and although this is not the place for the detailed 
discussion of such a question, it may be in place to state here that, 
with the exception of the "Hymn to Aton" of Amenophis IV (1392- 
1374 B. C.) and the religious reformation carried out by this monarch, 
there is, prior to the Persian period, no indication of even a tendency 
toward religious universalism or monistic speculation. (This will be 
taken up more fully in the 2nd volume.) As to the naive materialistic 
monotheism of Amenophis IV (Ichenaton), it must be stated em- 
phatically that this was neither the organic growth out of the previous 
religious development of Egypt, nor the point of departure for a new 
movement, but that it was essentially an individualistic reform, 
beginning and virtually ending with Amenophis IV. There is a 
radical difference between Amenophis' Hymn and the older Egyptian 
songs theorizing about the sun-god, Amon-Re. Though both have 
in common that they consider the sun-god the creator of the world 
and the supreme god, the songs differ from the hymn in that they 
do not regard Amon-Re as the sole god, but only as one among many 
gods. Furthermore, in the old songs Amon-Re is essentially a national 
god, Egypt alone being the object of his care and interest, while in the 
hymn of Amenophis IV Aton is represented as a universal God whose 
sphere of interest extends over the whole world. But the fate which 
the reform of Amenophis IV met with at the hands of his contem- 
poraries is the most conclusive proof that what this great monarch 
carried out was not the result of natural growth but of personal genius. 
Immediately upon his death the whole country rose in open revolt 
against his religious innovation, and with a fanaticism unparalleled in 
history literally effaced all trace of his reform. Even his name was 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 159 

which the ancient world presented at the time was 
adapted to inspire just the opposite of idealism and 
abiding faith: it was a world of moral chaos and 
spiritual confusion, a world in which brute force 
reigned supreme. The small kingdoms were the 
helpless prey of the world-powers, and hardly even 
would these latter have built up their mighty empires 
on the ruins of vanquished nations than their struc- 
tures would in turn be wrecked or threatened by new 
rivals. One would expect such conditions to incline 
the people to a belief in a blind, inexorable fate rather 
than to a belief in a supreme being who guides history 
toward an absolutely moral goal — toward the reign of 
righteousness among men. And as a matter of fact, 
from the close of the Persian period, this belief in a re- 
lentless fate as the controlling power of the universe 
took ever stronger hold of the minds of the pagan 
world. 1 

expunged from the records of his age, so that both the man and his 
work sank into oblivion; only in far distant Nubia a solitary monu- 
ment of this monarch remained in the Temple which he had built, 
and which contained on its walls his Hymn to Aton. This hymn of 
Amenophis IV certainly exercised no influence whatever on the 
subsequent religious development of Egypt, and there is no proof nor 
even likelihood that it ever had any influence on the religious thought 
of the other Oriental countries. 

1 This fatalism of antiquity, in reality, a sidereal fatalism, has its 
roots in the astrology of ancient Babylonia, which, as Fr. Cumont 
remarks, "was religious in its origin and in its principles." With the 
close of the Assyrian and the rise of the Neo-Babylonian empire, as 
the research of recent years has shown, astro-theological speculations 
attained greater predominance in the Babylonian and Assyrian coun- 
tries than ever before. From the latter centre, as has further been 
shown, astrology with its belief in an absolute determinism was intro- 
duced into Egypt, where in the Hellenistic period it was developed to 
a most elaborate system of religious-philosophical speculation, and 
whence it spread over the entire Hellenistic world. There can be no 



160 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Our discussion has shown that the inspiration of the 
literary prophets and the mantic possession or ecstasy 
of the older prophets are two distinct phenomena pro- 
ceeding from radically different states of mind, and 
not, as is widely thought, from a common psychical 
basis. It has further shown that inspiration, as the 
great literary prophets understood it, is the governing 
principle at the root of the new prophetic movement 
which began with Amos; and that, by virtue of this 
fact, literary prophecy is fundamentally different from 
the previous religious development of Israel; — in fact, 
that it can in no sense be considered the offspring or 
the continuation of the older prophecy, but must be 
regarded as a movement essentially independent and 
sui generis. 

Certain points of contact between the two exist 
of course. Like every great movement in history, 
literary prophecy had its antecedents and forerun- 
ners, among whom might be named the Recha- 
bites, Elijah, Micajah b. Jimlah, and Nathan, but 
none of these had advanced to the conception of rev- 
elation held by the great literary prophets, or to the 

doubt that the great political upheavals in both the Oriental and the 
Occidental world, which mark the history of those times, were partic- 
ularly conducive to this world-wide spread of fatalism. Cf. R. Reit- 
zenstein, "Poimandres," pp. 68ff., and Bousset's review of the latter 
work in "Gottinger Gelehrte Anzeigen," 1905, pp. 7043.; Fr. Cu- 
mont, "Les Religions Orien tales dans Le Paganism Romain," pp. 
254-269; W. Kroll, "Aus der Geschichte der Astrologie" in "Neue 
Jahrbucher f. d. Klassiche Altertum," VII (1901), pp. 557~577; Fr. 
Boll, "Die Erforschung der antiken Astrologie," ib., XXI (1908), 
pp. 103-126; M. Jastrow, "Die Religion Babyloniens und Assyriens," 
II, pp. 418-457; P. Wendland, "Die Hellenistisch-Romische Cultur," 
pp. 592., 8of.; F. X. Kugler, "Im Bannkreis Babels," pp. 1 16-126; 
and J. Kaerst, "Geschichte des Hellenistischen Zeitalters," II, 1, 

pp. 203f. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 161 

prophetic view of the relation between man and God 
which follows therefrom. 1 The unbridgeable gap 
between the two forms of prophecy remains in the 
basic difference between inspiration and ecstasy or 
possession. 2 

1 1 Ki. XIX is not a product by Elijah, but a narrative about him. 
Apart from this, the story is not the uniform work of one author, but a 
composite product, in which are mirrored the conflicting views of 
successive ages in regard to revelation. For the original author of the 
story Mt. Horeb is still Yhwh's abode proper, the place par excellence 
where His revelation is to be sought; while the later author, whose 
work may be distinguished in w. n-i3a, is imbued with the pro- 
phetic idea of revelation: — for him God reveals Himself, not in the 
phenomena of nature (the hurricane, the earthquake, and the light- 
ning), but in "the still small voice." This view of the composition of 
Chap. XIX would explain the repetition of w. 9b, 10 in 13b, 14, and 
seems to me a more satisfactory solution than that proposed by 
Wellhausen in "Die Composition des Hexateuch und der Histori- 
schen Bucher des Alten Testaments," 3 , p. 280, n. 1. 

2 The lack of a clear discrimination between the older and the 
literary prophets on this vital point of revelation is a serious defect 
in the great majority of works on Old Testament prophecy. It is a 
defect which is found even in so excellent an exposition as that of 
Kittel in his new edition of "Geschichte des Volkes Israel," II, §§ 45, 
46. Proceeding from the supposition that the inspiration of the 
literary prophets and the ecstasy of the older prophets are psychi- 
cally related phenomena, Kittel looks upon Isaiah's and Jeremiah's 
consecration-visions as pathological phenomena akin to the ecstatic 
visions of the seers and diviners, and explains the throne, Seraphim, 
smoke, altar, etc. of Is. VI as things which the prophet really saw 
while in the ecstatic state {op. cit., pp. 438, 443-450); in reality, as 
pointed out above, these are but the imagery which the prophet 
employs to describe those spiritual experiences which elude direct 
expression. There is nothing original or individual about the imagery; 
it was simply drawn from the stock of popular notions about God and 
supernatural beings which were current in that age. What has been 
remarked above with reference to Cornill's explanation of the fact 
that the prophets preserved without alteration or adaptation even 
those prophecies in which their forecasts were contradicted by the 



1 62 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Nor does the fact that ecstasy is strongly in evidence 
in the prophet Ezekiel alter the situation in the least, 
for, Stade to the contrary, 1 Ezekiel does not really 
belong in the same category with the six great proph- 
ets, Amos, Hosea, Micah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and 
Deutero-Isaiah. No matter how greatly he was 
influenced by their ideas, he never rose to the spiritual 
heights attained by them, never caught the real essence 
of their doctrines. The prominence which the ritual- 
istic religion occupies in Ezekiel's system makes him 
the very antipodes of the great prophets. And as he 
differs from them in his conception of God and of 
man's relation to God, so inevitably does he differ 
from them also in his idea of revelation and inspira- 
tion. Smend's remark is to the point: "Im Sehertum 
hatte die Wahrsagung ihre S telle gehabt und helm V erf all 
der Prophetie taucht sie bei Ezechiel wieder auf. In 
merkwurdiger Selbsttduschung, die seiner Inspirations- 
vorstellung entstammt, gestaltet er von hinten nach 
seine Weissagungen nach der Gesckichte." 2 (" Reveal- 
ing the future had had a place in seership, and, on the 
decline of prophecy, it appeared again in Ezekiel. 
In strange self-deception, which proceeds from his 
idea of inspiration, he constructs his prophecies back- 
wards in accordance with history.") As a matter of 
fact, Ezekiel's writings reveal the interesting fact that 
the method employed by him is closely related to that 
in vogue in Apocalyptic Literature, that is to say, 

actual outcome of events, applies also to Kittel's view of the "Eigenart 
des prophetischen Bewusstseins und Seelenlebens" and the "psycholo- 
gische Form der Ausserung prophetischen Geistes." Kittel's view is at 
bottom nothing else than the dogmatic and pagan notion of revelation 
as defined by Plato and Philo. 

1 See "Biblische Theologie des Alten Testaments," p. 206. 

2 Op.cit.,p. 190. 



INSPIRATION AS OPPOSED TO DIVINATION 163 

a good many of his predictions are only disguised as 
such, they are in reality vaticinia post eventum. 

With this it accords that the writings of Ezekiel, 
like those of Zachariah later, are manifestly not the 
immediate product of inspiration, but the labored 
product of speculation and study. If we compare, 
e. g., the visions of Ezekiel (Chaps. Iff., VIIIfL) and 
Zachariah (in Chaps. I, 7- VI, 8) with those of Isaiah 
and Jeremiah, we find that the vital element of 
spontaneity which characterizes the latter is al- 
together absent from the former, and in place of it we 
meet with a minutely elaborated symbolism, which 
serves as a fantastic garb for the prophet's theological 
views. This symbolic and studied imagery of Ezekiel 
(and also of Zachariah), it should be noted, has noth- 
ing in common with the poetic imagery in Isaiah's 
consecration- vision, by means of which the prophet 
effectively describes his spiritual experience. The 
difference between the artificial method of Ezekiel 
and the direct presentation of Isaiah and Jeremiah 
may be further illustrated by the fact that Ezekiel, 
though he devotes fully twenty-five verses to the de- 
scription of his vision of consecration (Chap. I), de- 
lineating with great diffuseness every detail of the 
apparition, the cherubs with the chariot, the chariot- 
wheels, the firmament with the throne supported 
by the cherub-chariot, and, finally, "the appearance of 
the One above the throne," does not until the very 
end communicate the fact that he is facing God; while 
Isaiah and Jeremiah, in their consecration-visions, 
bring out immediately the dominant thought that 
their soul was standing face to face with the Eternal 
and heard the secrets of His counsel. 



PART III 



CHAPTER I 

HOW THE PROPHETIC UTTERANCES 
BECAME LITERATURE 

Our investigation, in Part I, Chap. II, of Jeremiah's 
persecution during the reign of Jehojakim brought out 
the fact that the Temple-sermon, and not the reading 
of his prophecies by Baruch four years later, formed 
the decisive event in the prophet's career, and that, 
consequently, Jer. XXXVI does not possess the 
significance generally attributed to it for the history 
of his life. This chapter, however, is invaluable to 
us in that it gives definite enlightenment on a point 
which, otherwise, no doubt, would lead to much 
vexed discussion. As soon as it is granted that Jere- 
miah spoke altogether by word of mouth, the question 
naturally rises as to how his prophecies came to be 
written down and preserved; and to this question 
Chap. XXXVI gives the answer. We learn that in the 
first place it was owing to the prophet's own solicitude 
that his prophecies were preserved, and we learn also 
to what end he wished them to be preserved. 

Verses 27-32 tell us not only that Jeremiah himself 
arranged for the second collection of his prophecies 
after the first had been burned by Jehojakim, but also 
that he enlarged this second collection by adding to it 
his later prophecies. Proof of the latter is the state- 
ment, v. 32, "There were added to them, besides, many 
similar prophecies." This express statement, which, it 
is important to note, contains no specification as to 

167 



1 68 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

the time when the addition was made, can refer only 
to those prophecies and confessions of Jeremiah which 
originated later than the fifth year of Jehojakim's 
reign, and not, as Duhm is inclined to assume, to a 
more complete collection of his former prophecies; * 
for vv. 2, 4 mention expressly that the first collection 
contained all the prophecies which Jeremiah had 
delivered from the day of his consecration as prophet, 
in the thirteenth year of Josiah, up to the fourth year 
of Jehojakim. This interpretation of " There were 
added to them, besides, many similar prophecies" is 
further borne out by the fact that there is no mention 
whatever of this addition in w. 27-31, which relate 
God's behest to Jeremiah after the scroll had been 
burned by the King: "Take another scroll and write 
in it all the words 2 that were in the first scroll which 
Jehojakim, the king of Judah, hath burned." The only 
addition mentioned in the behest is the brief personal 
threat against Jehojakim (w. 30-31). 

Though not directly stated in this connection, 
Jeremiah's purpose in preserving his prophecies is 
obvious. The fate his scroll had met with at the 
hands of the King had shown beyond a doubt that his 
prophecies were ineffectual for his own age. But the 
prophet foresaw other ages ; when justice would tri- 
umph and the truth have recognition, and to these 
future and more discerning ages, he was determined 
that his words should be handed down. Again and 
again he declared that it was to the future that he 
looked for the realization of his hopes, and through all 
the vicissitudes of his career he never failed to assert 
his conviction that some day some good was bound 

1 "Das Buch Jeremia," ad loc. 

2 harisonim omitted, in accordance with the LXX. 



PROPHETIC LITERATURE 169 

to come from his prophetic calling. Corroboration of 
this view is furnished by XXX, 2L: "Thus saith the 
Lord, the God of Israel, write all the words that I have 
spoken to thee in a scroll; for verily days are to come, 
saith the Lord, when I shall make a change in the 
condition of my people, Israel and Judah, and shall 
bring them back to the land which I gave to their 
fathers, that they may possess it [again]." 

As to the other prophets, we know, at least in the 
case of Isaiah, or, to be quite exact, in regard to certain 
of Isaiah's prophecies, that it was the prophet himself 
who took care that they should be preserved, and that 
he was influenced thereto by the same considerations 
as those by which Jeremiah was moved. Thus Is. 
XXX, 8 states that, at the behest of God, Isaiah put 
down in writing the prophecies which he had spoken 
at the time of the alliance of Judah with Egypt (705- 
701), "in order that they might serve as a lasting 
testimony * in the days to come." And in Chap. VIII, 
because of the manifest indifference of the King 
and the people to his prophecies during the time 
of the Syro-Ephraimitic campaign, the prophet de- 
clares that there is nothing left for him to do but to 
entrust the message and revelation to his disciples for 
preservation, so that the purpose for which God 
revealed Himself to him may be ensured (Is. VIII, 
16-18). 

It may safely be concluded that the other prophets 
were likewise intent on having their prophecies pre- 
served, for they were one and all convinced that the 
fruit of their labor, the realization of God's purpose, 
belonged to the future. No one knew better than they 

1 Read, in accordance with Targ., Pes., and Vulg. la'ed for la 1 ad. 
The plural, "they," is in accordance with the reading of the LXX. 



170 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

that the burning words they addressed to their con- 
temporaries fell on deaf ears; yet they never doubted 
the ultimate efficacy of their labors, never wavered in 
their hope of the future. 

It will not be out of place to point out in this con- 
nection that the probable reason why no trace of 
Urijah's prophecy, referred to in Jer. XXVI, 20, has 
come down to us is the simple one that owing to his 
execution he had no opportunity of providing for its 
preservation. The fact that it was a single prophecy 
would not be sufficient explanation, as among the 
writings of the Minor Prophets we have so short a 
book as Haggai. (Obadjah, consisting of but a single 
chapter, can hardly be cited here, as the popularity of 
the theme of the pamphlet would account for its 
preservation among the Minor Prophets.) 

In view of the facts brought out above, it is obvious 
that the view referred to incidentally on pp. 87L, 
that the preservation of the utterances of the prophets 
was due to their disciples' initiative rather than to 
their own is untenable. 1 And equally untenable is 
another very common view of the origin of the pro- 
phetic writings, viz., that the prophets started by put- 
ting into writing certain single detached utterances, 
or, it may be, complete separate sermons, as an effect- 
ive means of supplementing their oral preaching. 
The scholars who hold this view argue that, in com- 
mitting any particular utterance or sermon to writing, 

1 Of recent years, this view has been expressed, with reference to 
Isaiah, by Guthe, in Kautzsch 3 , I, p. 549, by Harper, "Amos and 
Hosea" (in Intern. Crit. Com.), p. CXXVI, and by Hans Schmidt, 
"Die grossen Propheten und ihre Zeit" (in "Die Schriften des 
Alten Testaments" herausgegeben von Gressmann, etc., II, 2, p. 80); 
and, with reference to Amos, by E. Baumann, "Der Aufbau der 
Amosreden," p. 67, and Nowack, "Die Kleinen Propheten," p. 121. 



PROPHETIC LITERATURE 171 

the prophets meant to give their hearers the oppor- 
tunity of reading it at home, when they could give 
more careful thought to it, but that, more particu- 
larly, they sought by this means to reach those who 
were not present at the time they delivered their 
message. For the latest expression of this view 
Kittel, " Geschichte des Volkes Israel," II, p. 454, may 
be referred to. Kittel sees in these beginnings of the 
prophetic writings in the form of separate sermons, 
or short collections of single utterances, something 
similar to the fly-sheets or pamphlets current among 
other nations in periods of political or religious un- 
rest. The separate pieces, he reasons, were in the 
course of time gathered together into minor collections, 
and these in turn into books. This was the method 
of origin, Kittel asserts, "at least in the case of Isaiah, 
and, probably, also in the case of Amos and some 
others, while Jeremiah waits twenty-three years and 
then issues a larger collection of sermons." Kittel 
grants in a foot-note that there is no direct proof that 
even the book of Isaiah originated in this manner, 
but, in accordance with the widely prevailing view 
of the composition of the book of Isaiah, he thinks 
that the way the various sermons are combined in 
the present book of Isaiah makes this the probable 
process of origin. 1 

1 The question whether in the arrangement of the book of Isaiah 
there is sufficient basis for such a view cannot be discussed here, but 
must be reserved for the detailed study of Isaiah in the 2nd vol. It 
should be remarked, however, that this view of the origin of the book 
of Isaiah is shared also by Robertson Smith in "The Prophets of 
Israel," pp. 210, 215L, 235L, but in "The Old Testament in the 
Jewish Church," p. 3oif., he advances the view presented in these 
pages with regard to the writings of Isaiah and those of the other 
prophets. 



172 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

In regard to Kittel's reference to Jeremiah it must 
be pointed out that, when Jeremiah, after the battle 
at Karkemish, committed his past prophecies to 
writing, the thought of having them sent broadcast 
among the people did not enter his mind. Nor by 
Baruch's rehearsal did he mean to afford the people 
a better acquaintance with his prophecies. He had 
Baruch read his past prophecies, together with his 
special message for that occasion, 1 before the people 
assembled from all quarters of the country in the 
Temple at Jerusalem 2 for the reason that he was 
unable to deliver his message in person, as, because 
of the death-sentence hanging over his head, he dared 
not appear in public. Had he been able to appear 
in person before the people, the probability is that he 
would not have resorted to the altogether exceptional 
step of having all his previous prophecies rehearsed 
to the people, but would simply have referred to them 
by way of adding weight to the present utterance, and 
as proof of his prophetic foresight. The events which 
had just transpired at Karkemish were a vindication 
of all his past preaching, and, although he could not 
point this out himself (as he was no doubt burning to 

1 See supra, Part I, Chap. II, § 4. 

2 It should be remembered that it was customary for the prophets to 
avail themselves of such occasions as this for delivering their message, 
unless the circumstances of the case prompted to immediate action. 
Thus Jeremiah, four years before, had on a similar occasion delivered 
his famous Temple-sermon. Also Amos delivered his message at 
Beth-El during the great fall-festival, when that famous sanctuary 
was filled with pilgrims from all parts of the country. And Isaiah, we 
know, delivered several of his sermons at this season of the year in the 
Temple at Jerusalem, e. g., Chap. XXVIII (cf. the reference in vv. 
7-8 to the riotous feasting of people and priest), and XXIX, 1-14 
(v. 1 shows that it was during the festive season at the completion of 
the year that the sermon was delivered). 



PROPHETIC LITERATURE 173 

do), he was determined the people should understand 
that the prophecies which they had scorned had been 
fulfilled. They should be forcibly reminded that he 
had foretold these very events, they should be con- 
vinced that he was indeed inspired by God (cf. also 
infra, p. 207). 

Further, the view of Kittel and others as to the 
motive by which the prophets were actuated in put- 
ting their prophecies into writing is not borne out by 
the report, Jer. XXXVI, 27-32, of Jeremiah's second 
collection of his prophecies ; for that matter, it is not 
borne out by any of the various passages in Jeremiah 
and Isaiah which refer to the prophet's recording his 
prophecies or to his recording certain words or trans- 
actions, as the case may be. There is no suggestion, 
even, in these passages that would justify such a view. 
On the contrary, whenever the reason is stated for 
the prophet's writing down his prophecies, whether 
all of them or certain ones, or for his making any other 
record, it is invariably to the effect that the document 
or record shall serve as a testimony for future ages. 
This holds good not only of Jer. XXX, 2f., Is. XXX, 
8, VIII, 16-18, which have been dwelt upon above, 
but also of Jer. XXXII, 10-15, which relate how 
Jeremiah took pains to preserve the deed of the pur- 
chase when he bought the land from his cousin 
Hanamel. 1 Also when Isaiah, at the time of the Syro- 
Ephraimitic campaign, summarized his prediction 
in the words, "Maher-shalal-hash-baz" — "Spoil is 
speedy, plunder is hasty" — and engraved the words, 
in the presence of witnesses, on a tablet, he did it, as 
even Kittel acknowledges, in order that, when his 
forecast would be proved true by events, there should 
1 Cf. supra, p. 19. 



174 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

be documentary evidence of his prediction to that 
effect. 

Finally, the view of Kittel and others of the origin 
of the prophetic writings presupposes that the people 
manifested a general interest in the preaching of the 
prophets, while every utterance of the prophets is 
evidence that the very opposite was the case. 1 

Naturally, in discussing how the prophetic utter- 
ances came to be put down in writing, there can be 
reference only to the preexilic prophets, who delivered 
their messages in the first place by word of mouth. 
In the case of Deutero-Isaiah there can hardly be any 
doubt that his writings, Is. XL-LV, had book-form 
from the very first. They are not a series of separate 
detached sermons or messages, like the writings of the 
preexilic prophets, but form one continuous discourse. 
Regarding the manner of their circulation, they offer 
no clue as to whether they were sent broadcast 
among the Jewish captivity, or whether their author 
delivered them personally before a large assembly of 
the exiles; but, from what we know in general about 
the conditions and customs of those times, the latter 
would seem to be the more likely theory. As to 
Ezekiel and Zachariah, there is no room for any ques- 
tion — their writings, as pointed out above, are not the 
spontaneous product of the intuitive, but the studied 
product of the speculative faculty, and there can be 
no doubt that their earliest formulation was in 
writing. 

From the fact, that the great preexilic prophets 
showed such solicitude for the preservation of their 
prophecies, it follows that the term, " literary proph- 
ecy," is by no means a misleading term, Stade to the 
1 Cf. infra, pp. 266f., 2945. 



PROPHETIC LITERATURE 175 

contrary, 1 but rather a most appropriate one, par- 
ticularly suited to bring out an essential point of 
difference between the older prophecy and the new 
movement marked by the appearance of Amos. The 
older prophets were concerned about the present; 
their vision and their energy were directed to the 
events of the hour; their purpose embraced only their 
own times and their own countrymen. The newer 
prophets beheld a scheme reaching into the far future; 
they were more vitally concerned about the ultimate 
working out of this scheme than about the affairs of 
their own day; their message was not for their com- 
patriots or contemporaries alone, but for all men in 
the days to come — hence the necessity for its preserva- 
tion in writing; their vision and their purpose were 
centered in that ideal future which should some day 
come to pass. 

1 See "Biblische Theologie des Alt. Test.," pp. 207!., and ZATW., 
XXIII, p. 161. 



CHAPTER II 

THE PROPHETS BELIEVE THE DOOM 
INEVITABLE 

If the essential point of difference between the older 
and the literary prophets dwelt on in the preceding 
chapter is borne in mind, the question, whether the 
prophets' announcements of judgment are to be con- 
sidered as conditional or as absolute predictions, is 
a very simple one. That there is a division of opinion 
among the scholars on this question is to be attributed 
to the fact that the presentation commonly given of 
preexilic prophecy gives undue prominence to the 
prophets ' preaching of doom and somewhat obscures 
the more essential feature of their preaching. If the 
main stress is laid on the prophets' forecasting of 
doom, and their preaching considered principally from 
this point of view, one would have to conclude with 
Volz and others that the prophets "to the very last 
hoped for the conversion of the people and the warding 
off of the judgment," that "only on this supposition 
their preaching and especially the putting down of 
their sermons in writing has sense;" 1 or one would 
have to grant the validity of the argument which 
Giesebrecht advances in contesting the view of Smend, 
that the prophets look forward to the catastrophe as 

1 See "Die vorexilische Jahveprophetie und der Messias" (1897), 
p. 8; and among others also Stade "Biblische Theologic des Alt. 
Test's," § 107, and E. Kautzsch, "Die Biblische Theologie des Alten 
Testaments" (1911), pp. 2011., 251!!. 

176 



THE DOOM INEVITABLE 177 

inevitable (pp. cit., 191, 194). "Why," Giesebrecht 
asks, "do the prophets not confine themselves to a few 
oracular utterances announcing the disaster that threat- 
ens them? Why do they take such pains to show the 
people their iniquity and to awaken in them a belief 
in their approaching disaster? Why do they waste so 
many words if they know beforehand that no amount 
of talking will avail?" * 

But when the vital factor of the prophetic preaching 
is taken into consideration, the transcendent faith of 
the prophets in the final triumph of righteousness and 
their belief in the subservience of present events to 
this great end, there is no room for such reasoning. 
Nor is there room for the theory entertained by 
Duhm, 2 Cornill, 3 and Henry P. Smith 4 in regard to 
Jeremiah, and by W. Staerk 5 in regard to Amos and 
Hosea, that, at least at the beginning of their activity, 
the prophets hoped that the people might be affected 
by their preaching and that thus the doom might be 
averted. A systematic interpretation of the prophetic 
writings shows that at no time of their activity did 
the prophets entertain such a hope. They were aware 
from the outset that they were preaching to deaf ears, 
for they fully realized the insuperable difference in re- 
ligious views which separated them from the people; 
and they did not fail to make clear their belief that by 

1 "Die Berufsbegabung der Alttestamentlichen Propheten" (1897), 
p. 82. 

2 Op. cit., general remarks on Chaps. II-IV, 4, and IV, 5-VI, p. 471. 

3 "Das Buch Jeremia," Einleitung, p. XXVIII, and p. 36. 

4 "Old Testament History," p. 290. 

5 "Das Assyrische Weltreich im Urteile der Propheten" (1908), 
pp. 14, 38ff.; this view is taken also by Meinhold, "Studien zur 
israelitischen Religionsgeschichte," pp. 431!., and Harper, "Amos and 
Hosea," p. CXX. 



178 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

nothing short of the overthrow of the whole religious- 
social structure could the people be brought to the 
realization of their delusions and superstitious beliefs. 
It was for the furtherance of the ultimate purpose 
which the prophets believed God pursued in calling 
them, and not because they hoped their exhortations 
might be heeded by their contemporaries, that they 
took pains to set forth how the doom might be averted. 
If these obvious facts are to-day recognized to a 
less extent even than formerly, the mistaken views, 
which we had occasion to point out above, 1 are 
largely responsible for it, viz., the view now upheld 
by many that the prophetic sermons consist of epi- 
grammatically short utterances, and the contrary view 
advanced by others that they have, to a large extent, 
come down to us in a fragmentary form. 

1 Supra, pp. 88 and 91. 



CHAPTER III 
JEREMIAIFS VIEW OF THE DOOM 

The majority of Jeremiah's sermons speak with 
such clearness and certainty of the impending judg- 
ment that they need not be considered in detail. Only 
those sermons and passages need be considered which, 
at first glance, might seem to bear out the view that 
the prophet's predictions of doom are conditional. 

The sermons which come into consideration from 
this point of view are: XIII, 15-27; XIV, 1-18 (19- 
XV, 4), XV, 5-9; and IV, 3-31. Of these the last- 
mentioned, IV, 3-31, belongs to the very oldest of 
Jeremiah's prophecies, — on this point exegetes are 
unanimous; the second, XIV, 1-18 (19-XV, 4), XV, 
5-9, contains no clue whatever to its date. The first, 
XIII, 15-27, belongs to the later period of Jeremiah's 
activity, for v. 21 presupposes the ascent of the 
Chaldseans to power. Beyond this, there is no 
possibility of fixing the date more exactly. It has 
wrongly been inferred from the mention of "the 
Queen Dowager" in v. 18 that the dirge, vv. i8f., 
must have originated in the time of Jehojachin, as, 
owing to the great youth of this king, the Queen 
Dowager, no doubt, exercised a strong influence on 
the affairs of the state during his brief rule. However, 
in view of the fact that the queen dowager was in 
any case a most important personage, always ranking 
immediately after the king (much like the queen- 
consort to-day in Occidental countries), it was but 

179 



180 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

natural that in his dirge the prophet should call 
upon her together with the King to mourn over 
the certain destruction of the nation. Another, but 
still more farfetched, conclusion regarding the time 
of origin, which has been drawn by some scholars 
from "I must weep in secret," is that the piece, or the 
part in question, must have been written at the time 
when Jeremiah lived in hiding from Jehojakim — else 
" why did he have to weep in secret? " 1 But both from 
a literary and a psychological standpoint the expres- 
sion admits of no such deduction. a To weep in 
secret" is a perfectly natural expression up to the 
present day; it may even be classed among the stock 
expressions of literature. The natural impulse of 
sorrow is not to weep on the housetop or on the public 
square. 

I. CHAP. XIII, 15-27 

The opening of the sermon effectively mirrors 
Jeremiah's frame of mind. The prophet begins with a 
brief exhortation to the people to do penance while 
there is yet time. He would rouse his people from 
their apathy, but immediately his mind is crowded 
with pictures of the certain doom toward which in 
their blindness they are hastening. Under the figure 
of a gathering storm he suggests rather than describes 
the terror and dismay in which they will be engulfed 
when the night of doom suddenly breaks over them: — 
They will wait for the storm to pass by, hoping for 
light, but, instead, they will be plunged into im- 

1 See Duhm, op. ciL, prefatory remarks to XIII, 15-27; Erbt 
" Jeremia und seine Zeit," p. 217, and Cornill, op. ciL, p. 180, who both 
accept Duhm's view. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 181 

penetrable darkness, wrapped in the shadow of 
death: 

"Hear ye, and give ear, be not haughty, 

for the Lord speaketh! 

Give honor to the Lord, your God, 

before it groweth dark, 

before your feet stumble against the mountains of 

darkness — 
Ye shall hope for light, 

but it will be changed * to the shadow of death, 
will be turned to impenetrable darkness. 
But if ye pay no heed, 

I must weep in secret because of [your] haughtiness, 
my eyes must shed tears, 2 

for the flock of the Lord is led away captive" (w. 15- 
i7). 

So certain and so real is it all to him that he con- 
tinues in w. 18-19 with a dirge over the fallen nation. 
He calls upon the royal house to mourn over their 
departed glory, their ruined country: 

"Speak 3 to the King and to the Mistress [of the land], 

sit lowly, 
for your glorious crown has fallen from your head. 

1 Read iv e samoh instead of w e samah. The subject Yhwh, of 
samoh and jaslth is omitted, as in Job III, 20, VIII, 18, et alii.; the 
omission is for the purpose of heightening the effect, and the case 
belongs properly in the category of impersonal construction. The 
asyndeton jasith (Kethib) adds to the vividness of the description; the 
change to Wsiih by the Masorites was a blunder. 

2 Omit wedamo'a tidma' , the phrase being a variant of wHherad 
dim' a. 

3 Read, in accordance with the LXX, 'imrii instead of >ae mor. 



182 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

The cities of the South 1 are shut up, 2 
there is none to open them. 3 
Judah is carried away captive entirely, 
is carried away captive completely." 

Note, how v. 1 7 with its perfect of certitude, ni$bd, 
"the flock of the Lord is led away captive," leads up 
skilfully to this vision of the downfall. No less perfect 
is the connection between the latter and the apos- 
trophe with which in v. 20 he turns to the country, 
bidding her note how the enemy is invading the land, 
though this sudden transition makes the impression, 
at first glance, of a break in the thought: 

"Lift up thine eyes and behold 4 them that come from 

the North! 
What of the flock that hath been entrusted to thee? 
What of thy beautiful flock?" 

The verse is just another variation of the prophet's 
vision of the coming doom, and in its turn leads 
up logically, though imperceptibly, to the concluding 
part, vv. 21-27. With the close of v. 20 the prophet 
has got back to the actual present, and he continues 
in 2 iff. by asking the nation, the mother of the coun- 
try, what she will say then, when all these terrors 
have come to pass, when those whom in her blindness 

1 That is, all the cities, even to the extreme boundary of the South. 

2 That is, are desolate, life and traffic have ceased; cf. Is. XXIV, 10. 

3 potheah is a case of potential participle; the subject 'are is to be 
construed also as object with pothe^h, a construction which occurs 
quite frequently. 

4 Read, as the Kethib demands, s e 'i and r e 't, and, accordingly, 
'enajikh, as the LXX in fact read. The text-disorder arose through a 
copyist's mistake in thinking this verse also addressed to the King and 
the Queen Dowager. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 183 

she has befriended have become her masters. 1 And 
when she asks why all this has befallen her, he adds, 
then shall she know that it is because of her sinfulness. 
The hopeless finality of the prophet's belief is 
expressed in his exclamation: 

"Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard 

his spots? 
Verily, then would ye be able to do good 
who are practised in doing evil" (v. 23). 

Only after a long period of suffering in exile, he 
declares in conclusion, will they finally be cleansed 
from their errors and their corruption : 

"I shall disperse them like chaff 
that is tossed before the wind of the desert. 
This is thy lot, the portion assigned unto thee 
by me, saith the Lord, because thou hast forgotten me 
and hast put thy trust in falsehood. . . . 
Woe unto thee, Jersualem, 

thou shalt not be cleansed for a long time yet!" 
(w. 24, 25, 27b). 

In reviewing XIII, 15-27 it will be seen that they 
have one central thought and form a well-connected 
whole, and that there is, consequently, no basis for 
the view taken by recent exegetes, that they are 
merely fragments of three different sermons. 

1 In v. 21 read, as Cornill (op. cit., ad loc.) on the ground of the 
LXX rightly emends, jippaq e du instead of jiphqod, and construe 
l e ros with jippaq e du 'alajikh; w e at Ummadt 'otham 'alajikh 'alluphim 
is parenthetical. The mistaken reading by the Masorites is to be 
accounted for by the fact that the 3rd plur. was written without the 
vowel letter, w. 



184 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

2. CHAPS. XIV, I-l8 (19-XV, 4), XV, 5-9 

XIV, 19-XV, 4 are generally acknowledged to be 
out of place; the declaration of the preceding verses, 
that the doom of the people is sealed, cannot possibly 
have been followed by a renewed prayer for help. The 
solution of the difficulty, however, is not to be found 
in the assumption that this whole passus is the work 
of a later author, but in the conclusion that XIV, 
19-XV, 2 are another version of the prayer, XIV, 7-9, 
and of God's reply to it in vv. 10, 12. Proof of this 
is that in vv. 19-22 the reference to the drought is 
even more pronounced than in vv. 7-9; note partic- 
ularly the concluding verse 22: 

"Are there among the illusions of the nations any 

that have power to cause rain? x 

Or doth the Heaven give showers? 

Is it not rather Thou, Yhwh, our God? 

In Thee do we hope, for Thou effectest all this." 

"Do not disgrace the throne of thy glory," of v. 21 
furnishes no argument against Jeremiah's authorship 
of these verses, since, as we shall see later, the prayer 
for deliverance from their present distress is put by 
the prophet in the mouth of the people. 

XV, 3 is a prosaic comment on verse 2. Verse 4 is 
evidently also a later addition. It ascribes the im- 
pending judgment to the wrong-doing of Manasseh, 
which, we know, is contrary to the principle of indi- 
vidual responsibility expressed by Jeremiah. Through- 
out his preaching Jeremiah represents the judgment 
as coming, not because of the sin of any one individual 

1 magUmlm is potential participle. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 185 

(particularly of an individual of a past generation), 
but because of the general corruption of his own age. 
Contrary to the opinion of the scholars who hold 
that XIV, 2-XV, 9 consist of two originally separate 
pieces, the first of which, XIV, 2-10, treats of a 
drought, and the second, 11-18, XV, 5-9, of a catastro- 
phe which is to come by sword, famine, and pesti- 
lence, 1 an exact analysis leaves no doubt, to my mind, 
that XIV, 2-6 . . ., 7-10, 12 (= 19-XV, 2), XIV, 
13-18, XV, 5-9 form an organic whole. It is most un- 
likely that the drought per se would be the subject of 
Jeremiah's sermon; it is far more probable that he 
dwells on it only incidentally, while dealing with the 
real crisis with which he is preoccupied in every one of 
his sermons, that is, the coming destruction of the na- 
tion. The description of the suffering caused through- 
out the country by the drought (w. 2-6) serves as a 
setting for the prophet's prediction of doom, and ef- 
fectively heightens the gloom and terror of the latter: 

" Judah mourneth, her gates languish, 
they are bowed to the ground in mourning; 
and the wail of Jerusalem ascendeth. 
Her nobles 2 send their servants for water; 
they come to the wells, they find no water, 
they return with empty vessels, 
dejected and confounded and with heads covered. 3 
The tillage 4 of the soil hath stopped, 

1 See among others, Cornill, op. cit., ad loc, and Rothstein in 
Kautzsch 3 , ad loc. 

2 Read 'addiraha (LXX). 

3 We would say "with faces covered," as a sign of utter consterna- 
tion. 

4 Read, in accordance with the LXX, wa' a bho~dath instead of 



1 86 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

for there hath been no rain in the land; 

the husbandmen are dismayed, they cover their heads. 

Even the hind in the woods beareth and forsaketh 

her young, 1 
because there is no grass; 
and the wild-asses stand on the bare hills, 
they gasp for air like jackals, 
their eyes are languid, because there is no herbage." 

The prayer, w. 7-9, is not offered up by the prophet 
in behalf of the people, but is, as Duhm discerned, a 
prayer which the prophet represents the people as 
addressing in their present distress to Yhwh. 2 Proof 
of this is "Yet Thou, O Yhwh, abidest with us, and 
we are dedicated to Thee " 3 of the concluding v. 9. 
Such a declaration could not possibly have been made 
by Jeremiah as expressing his own view of the situa- 
tion, for it would be in contradiction to his whole 
preaching. Put in the mouth of the people, however, 
it cannot excite surprise, for the prophet well knew 
that, in spite of his protestations, the people believed 
firmly that Yhwh was present with them and that they 
were truly serving Him. This view of the prayer is 
corroborated, in my opinion, by Micah III, 9-1 1, 
where precisely this point is emphasized : 

ba a bhur. The mistake of the Masoretic text was caused in the first 
place by wa a bhodath being written abbreviated: 'TQJJ1. 

1 An interesting construction! The emphatic infinitive 'azobk has 
for its object the implied object of jal e da; this construction occurs 
frequently, cf. e. g., Hos. V, 14, ' a ni ,a nl aetroph w e 'elekh aessa 
w e 'en massll, "I shall make [them] my prey, and I shall carry off 
[the prey], and none will be able to rescue [it]"; Ps. XV, 4, nisba 
l e hara w e lo jamlr, "Though he pledges himself to his own loss, he 
does not break his pledge." 

2 See op. cit., adloc. 

1 See supra, p. 99, n. 1. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 187 

"Hear this, ye heads of the house of Jacob, 

and ye rulers of the house of Israel, 

that abhor justice and pervert right, 

that built up Zion by blood and Jerusalem by iniquity; 

. . . yet they profess to rely upon Yhwh, 

saying, verily, Yhwh abideth with us (h a lo jahwcB 

b e qirbentl), 
no evil can come upon us." 

It is interesting to note that Micah here, in showing 
the irony of the people's believing in spite of their 
corruptness that their lives are centered in God, puts 
practically the same words in their mouth (fold 
jahwcB b e qirbenu) as Jeremiah does in verse 9 of the 
prayer (vif'atta bh e qirbenil jahwce). 

Additional support for this view of the prayer is 
furnished by XII, 4: "How long shall the country 
mourn, and the herbage wither all over the land; 
because of the wickedness of her inhabitants (mera'ath 
jo^bhe bhd) beasts and birds are perishing," etc. This 
verse, as stated above, 1 must at one time have formed 
a part of the description of the drought with which the 
prophet opens this sermon. The indications are that 
its original position was between the present v. 6 and 
v. 7. In the first place, there seems to be a trace of it 
left in the airb Xaov a&LKias } read by the LXX 
AQ at the end of v. 6, and corresponding, though with 
a slight variant, to mera'ath jos e bhe bJid of XII, 4. 
Further, it will be noticed at a glance how perfectly 
the verse fits in after vv. 2-6. The question, "How 
long shall the country mourn, and the herbage wither 
all over the land?" with which the verse opens, is 
clearly a condensation of the two subparts of w. 2-6, 

1 See supra, p. nsf. 



1 88 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

viz., 2-4 and 5-6. These have just described minutely 
the gloom and the drought prevailing throughout the 
land; XII, 4a asks, substantially, how long this state 
of affairs shall last. As to XII, 4b, " because of the 
wickedness of her inhabitants beasts and birds are 
perishing," this explanation of the cause of the drought 
is what we should expect after the detailed description 
of its horrors. It is the pointing of the moral. In fact, 
the absence of such a reflection would be an exception 
to what may be considered the customary line of 
thought in such cases in prophetic literature. Finally, 
when XII, 4 is inserted here, its last part, ki 'am e ru 
lojir'ce 'aeth J ah a rithenil, if emended in accordance with 
the LXX, becomes at once clear and related. The 
LXX read after lojir'ce.'jahwce for the subject, and in- 
stead of 'ah a rithenu they read y orhothenu: — ki 'arn e ru 
lojir'cejahwce 'aeth 'orhothenu. ki (for which the LXX 
A has rcai) is introductory ki, which is frequently used 
in passing over to a new thought, as here, where the 
prophet turns from the description of the drought and 
his explanation of it to the people's reflections about it 
and their prayer to Yhwh. 'orhoth is used here in the 
same sense as Prov. I, 19, Job VIII, 13, "lot," "con- 
dition," "plight": "They speak Yhwh heedeth not 
our plight." This comment on the part of the people 
not only accords with, but also prepares us for, the 
note struck in the second part of the prayer: 

"O, Hope of Israel, its Savior in the time of trouble, 
why dost Thou act like a stranger in the land, 
like a wayfarer that tarrieth over night? 
Why dost Thou act like one that is dazed, 
like a hero that is powerless?" (vv. 8, 9a). 

If, as from all these facts it seems safe to conclude, 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 189 

XII, 4 originally preceded the prayer, XIV, 7-9, 
there can be no question as to who offers the prayer, 
since 'am e ru } "they speak," of XII, 4 expressly states 
that it is the people. 

In regard to the prayer, w. 19-22, of the parallel 
text, it is equally apparent that the people are rep- 
resented as praying. For only in this case would the 
words, "do not disgrace the throne of thy glory," of 
v. 21 be quite logical and natural. The people, indeed, 
believed Yhwh's honor to be imperilled by their 
plight. But not so Jeremiah; for him their distress 
in no wise reflected on Yhwh's honor — rather would 
their downfall, he believed, be the manifestation of 
Yhwh's glory. No proof to the contrary follows 
from the term, kabhle, "illusions," said of the gods 
of the nations in the concluding verse of tins prayer, 
supposed to be offered up by the people ; * an anachro- 
nism such as this is liable to occur in almost any author. 

In vv. 10, 12 the prophet gives God's answer to the 
people's prayer: The sinful life in which they indulge 
without restraint leaves Him no other course than to 
execute judgment. Their fasting, their prayers and 
sacrifices will not avail with Him; He will bring about 
the downfall of the nation, He declares, by war and 
its concomitant evils, famine and pestilence. 

Verse 11 is the work of an interpolate^ who thought 
the prayer was voiced by Jeremiah himself. Verse 1 2b , 
however, "but I will consume them by the sword, by 
famine, and by pestilence," was originally followed by 
haqdisem l e jom ffregd, XII, 3c, which like XII, 4, as 

1 The term, "illusions," with reference to the gods of the nations is 
altogether congruous not only with Jeremiah's religious views in 
general, but with his express statement in II, n that "they are not 
gods"; cf. also XVI, 19. 



igo THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

stated above, 1 got in its present place by mistake. 
Having just declared that He will destroy the nation, 
God bids the prophet " consecrate them for the day of 
slaughter. " Direct proof of this is the command in the 
parallel text, XV, i, 2: 

"Cast [them] 2 out of my sight and let them go," 
followed up by: 

"And if they ask you whither shall we go, 

tell them, thus saith the Lord, 

such as are destined for Death to Death, 

such as are destined for the sword to the sword, 

such as are destined for famine to famine, 

such as are destined for captivity to captivity." 

In fact this latter passage furnishes the clue to the 
interpretation and proper context of XII, 3c. 

As in IV, 10, V, 12-14, and 31, Jeremiah continues 
in XIV, I3~i7a that the naive assurance of the people 
and their prophets that his prediction of doom will 
not be proved true is a most pitiful delusion. In 
accordance with the form which suggested itself most 
naturally for the preceding part, XII, 4c, XIV, 7-10, 
12, XII, 3c, the prophet continues this part, too, 
in the form of a dialogue between himself and God. 
This uniformity of structure contributes materially 
to the proof that XIV, 2-6, XII, 4, XIV, 7-10, 12, 
XII, 3c, and XIV, i3~i7a are all pivoted in one centre 
and are consecutive parts of one sermon. 

The reiterated declaration that their doom is sealed 
(vv. 1 5-1 7a) is effectively followed up by a dirge: 

1 See supra, pp. n6f. 

2 The prepositional phrase, 'ael ha' am hazzce, of the preceding sen- 
tence is to be construed as direct object with sallah; the omission of 
the object adds to the vividness of the command. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 191 

"My eyes shed tears night and day, unceasingly, 
for the virgin daughter of my people has suffered 
a crushing calamity, a fatal blow. 
If I go into the fields, behold, those slain by the sword; 
if I enter the city, behold, those famished from hun- 
ger — Yea, even prophet and priest are bowed 
in mourning to the ground, void of knowledge " * 
(vv. 170-18). 

Note how the close of the dirge, with its picture of the 
despair and consternation with which priest and 
prophet will be seized on the day of doom, forms an 
effective contrast to vv. i3~i7a, which dwell upon the 
mistaken feeling of security in which they indulge at 
present. 

XV, 5-9 are the sequel of the dirge, XIV, 1 70-18; 
verse 5 forms a sort of connecting link between the 
two, inasmuch as it continues in the same strain as the 
dirge. These verses bear much the same relation to the 
dirge as XIII, 20-27 do to the preceding dirge, vv. 18- 
19. Like XIII, 20-27, they combine with the picture 
of the coming destruction an explanation of the cause 
of it: 

" 2 Who will have compassion with thee, Jerusalem? 

Who will extend sympathy unto thee? 

And who will turn aside to inquire about thy welfare? 

Thou hast rejected me saith the Lord; 

thou art given up to backsliding; 

1 Read, as stated above (p. 113), sah e ril for sah e ru and omit w e of 
weld. The mistake sah e ril is to be explained by the fact that, owing to 
the interchange of D and £> in Armaic, Vin$ was misread Vin"S? and 
subsequently written VlPID. Id jada'uis circumstantial clause; for the 
idea conveyed by "void of knowledge" see supra, pp. 113!. 

2 Omit kl, in accordance with the reading of the LXX. 



192 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

hence I will stretch out my hand and destroy thee, 

I weary of showing compassion. 

I will winnow them with the fork in the gates of the 

land, 1 
I will bereave, will annihilate 2 my people, 
since they turn not from their ways; 
their widows shall be more numerous 3 than the sand 

of the sea. 
I will cause the destroyer to descend 4 
upon the capital — upon the picked army — at midday; 
I will cause fear and terror to befall her suddenly " 

(w. 5-8). 

The customary translation of c al 'em bahur, "upon 
the mother of the young army-corps," v. 8b (in 
Kautzsch 3 'em is rendered "the mothers"), is wrong; 
there is, however, no need for Duhm's emendation of 
bahur to waul. I find the clue to the phrase in the 
rendering of it by the LXX: fjLrjrepa veavLa/covs, which 
shows that they took bahur not as genitive but as 
coordinate with 'em — a syntactical relation which is 
indicated also by the accents. This suggests that 'em 
has here the same meaning which it has in the hen- 
diadys, l lr w e 'em (bejisra'el), II Sam. XX, iq, 5 and also 
on Phoenician coins, 6 viz., " metropolis," with which 

1 "In the gates of the land," that is, where they will be conquered 
by the enemy. 

2 The perfects in the declaration, w. 7ff., belong in the category of 
the prophetic perfect. 

3 ll may be explained as dativus ethicus; the LXX, however, did not 
read it. 

4 Omit, in accordance with the LXX, lahaem. 

5 This is also Rashi's interpretation of 'em; Rashi, however, leaves 
bahur entirely unexplained. 

6 See Lidzbarski, " Nordsemitische Epigraphik," Wortschatz, s. v. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 193 

meaning also Syr. 'emd and Arab, 'ummun are 
found; cf. ninewe 'emd dathur, "Niniveh, the Metrop- 
olis of Assyria," 1 'ummu-lkurd and 'ummun alone = 
"Mecca," or any other "principal city," in explana- 
tion of which it is correctly remarked in al-Kamus, 
"every city is the 'ummun of the towns around it; " 2 
cf. further 'ummahdtu-lbilddi, "the principal cities of 
the country." 

The reference in our verse is clearly to the capital, 
Jerusalem, which fully accords with the opening verses 
of the passus, where Jerusalem is directly addressed. 
The collective bahur is a military term, just as in 
II Sam. VI, 1, 1 Ki. XII, 21, 1 Chron, XIX, 10, et alit., 
meaning " the elite of the army." Note the force of the 
asyndeton, 'em bahur, how it adds to the vividness, 
of the description — the conquest of the capital is 
nothing more nor less than the defeat of the garrison 
defending it. In view of the asyndeton, 'em bahur, the 
'alalia of the following part of the verse referring only 
to 'em is perfectly consistent. 

The meaning of 'em bahur throws light also on the 
concluding verse 9a: 

"She that hath given birth to seven 

fadeth away, she breatheth out her life, 

her sun setteth 3 in broad daylight, 4 

[and] she is thrown into dismay and confusion." 

"She that hath given birth to seven" — i. e., one that 
is in the highest degree prolific — is not to be under- 
stood as meaning literally a mother with many chil- 

1 Quoted in Payne Smith, "Thesaurus Syriacus," s. v. 'emd. 

2 Quoted in Lane, " Arabic-English Lexicon," s. v. 'ummun. 

3 Read, in accordance with the Kethib, ha' a. 

4 That is, unexpectedly. 



194 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

dren, but is figurative for the populous city. 1 The 
verse describes the fall of the capital, and the personifi- 
cation employed was suggested naturally by the refer- 
ence to it as "mother" in the preceding verse; cf. the 
similar personification in IV, 31 in the description of 
the death-agony of the nation. 2 With this verse the 
prophet falls back, in conclusion, into the strain of the 
dirge, v. 8b forming a logical transition. This close 3 
is but another illustration of the skill and harmony 
with which XV, 5-9 and the preceding dirge, XIV, 
170-18, are merged into one another. Note also that 
the circumstantial sentence, bosa w e hapherd, "and she 
is thrown into dismay and confusion," which speaks 
of the effect of the fall of the capital upon the people, 
forms the counterpart of "Yea, even prophet and 
priest are bowed in mourning to the ground, void of 
knowledge" of the dirge. 

Far from permitting the inference, therefore, "that 
Jeremiah still hoped to effect the conversion of the 
people and so to ward off the judgment," 4 the 
sermon, XIV, 2-XV, 9, in reality furnishes every 

1 The number seven is frequently used in the Bible, as in fact 
throughout ancient literature, to denote that one possesses a quality 
or performs a task to perfection, cf., e. g., Prov. IX, 1, "Wisdom hath 
built her house, she hath hewn her pillars sevenfold" (Ubh'a), mean- 
ing her structure is perfect. 

2 See infra, p. 202. 

3 Verse 9b, "And those that are left of them will I deliver to the 
sword before their enemies," cannot have originally followed 9a, being 
altogether incongruous with it (n e, umjahw<z, which was not read by 
the LXX, was added later, possibly in order to smooth over the 
incongruity). The half- verse may possibly have followed v. 7a 
("I shall winnow them with the fork in the gates of the land"), where 
it would fit in very well. 

4 This view of XIV, 2-XV, 9 is taken by Rothstein in Kautzsch 3 , 
prefatory remarks to Jer. XIV, i-XV, 9, and others. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 195 

proof that the doom was for him absolutely cer- 
tain. 

3. chap, iv, 3-31 

The same holds true, to an even greater extent, of 
IV, 3-3 1. 1 This sermon is a masterpiece of poetic 
description. For terseness and vividness of descrip- 
tion and for dramatic effect it has scarcely its equal 
in prophetic literature, and, outside of the Book of 
Job, there is nothing in the Bible that can be compared 
with it for mastery of style. The whole is a skilfully 
arranged tripartite piece depicting graphically the 
prophet's state of mind — in particular, how he is con- 
stantly beset by the pictures of the coming ruin. 

Jeremiah opens the sermon by exhorting the people 
to effect a real reform, a reform of their hearts and 
morals, lest certain destruction overtake them: 

" 2 Thus saith the Lord to the men of Judah and 

Jerusalem, 
break up your fallow ground and sow not among 

thorns. 
Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, 
remove the foreskin from your hearts, 
ye men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, 
lest my wrath come forth like fire 
and burn that none can quench it 
because of the evil of your doings" (w. 3,4). 

1 That IV, if. forms the conclusion of the sermon, III, 6ff., has been 
shown conclusively by Giesebrecht, "Das Buch Jeremia," 2 prefa- 
tory remarks to III, 6-IV, 2. 

2 ki, as Giesebrecht, op. cit., ad loc, rightly points out, must have 
been added later; possibly the whole half- verse is redactorial addi- 
tion; the LXXA did not read it. 



196 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

As if to show the irony of such an admonition, he 
leads his hearers abruptly into the midst of the 
judgment-scene, telling them to flee unto the fortified 
cities from the enemy invading the country: 

"Announce in Judah and Jerusalem, proclaim and 
say, 

sound the trumpet in the land, call aloud, 1 

bid them 2 assemble, that we may go into the fortified 
cities. 

Raise the standard toward Zion, flee, halt not! 

Yea, evil approacheth 3 from the north, a great de- 
struction. 

The lion hath come forth from the thicket, 

the destroyer of nations is on his way; 

he hath left his place in order to make thy land deso- 
late, 

that thy cities may become ruins, uninhabited. 

Because of this gird yourselves with sackcloth, mourn 
and wail; 

for the fierce anger of the Lord is not turned away from 
us" (vv. 5-8). 

Verse 8 has brought the prophet back, almost 
imperceptibly, one might say, from his visualization 
of the doom to the actual present; so he continues by 
contrasting the terror and confusion that will prevail 
on the day of doom with the present blind assurance of 

1 MaVu is elliptical phrase for maVu pikhaem (see Goldziher in 
ZDMG, XXVIII, 310, n. 1). 

2 Omit, in accordance with the LXX, the w e of w e imril. 

3 Instead of 'anokhl mebhi read, as Duhm, op. ciL, ad loc, rightly 
emends, ba'd — a reading attested in fact by Theodoret: iSov kolko. 
oltto fioppa l/o^erat kol (rvvrptf3r) fieydXrj (see Holmes & Parson, ad 
loc). 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 197 

the people — an assurance the more pathetic, when one 
considers that the sword is suspended over their 
heads: 

"On that day, saith the Lord, the King and the nobles 
shall lose courage, 

and the priests shall be appalled and the prophets be 
confounded. 

Then will they say, 1 Ah! Lord God, verily, 

Thou hast grievously beguiled this people and Jeru- 
salem 2 

by saying ye shall enjoy safety — 

whereas the sword toucheth [our] very lives. 

In that time it will be said about this people and 
Jerusalem, 

a scorching wind is blowing from the bare hills 

of the desert toward the daughter of my people, 

not to fan nor to winnow " (w. 9-1 1). 

"Not to fan nor to winnow" is the prophet's way of 
saying "to destroy." The sinister implication of the 
words is more forcible than if he had said "to de- 
stroy" outright. 

1 Read, in accordance with the LXXA, w e, am e rii instead of wa'd- 
mar; the mistake of the Masoretic text arose from the fact that the 
3d plur. was written without the final vowel-letter. The subject of 
w e 'am e ril is the priests and official prophets just mentioned, who at 
present assure the people, in the name of Yhwh, that they need fear 
no crisis. The official prophets and priests naturally believe their 
proclamations to be inspired by Yhwh, which explains the reproach 
which Jeremiah sarcastically puts in their mouth. 

2 The seemingly superfluous Hrusalaim, following after la' am hazzae, 
may be intentional on the part of the prophet, who no doubt wishes 
to make light of the people's belief in the inviolable sanctity of 
Jerusalem as the abode of Yhwh, this being the belief on which 
priests and prophets base their reassuring predictions. 



198 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Then he concludes this first part by a brief reference 
to the cause of the judgment. As in vv. 9 and 10, 
God is represented as speaking: 

"A full blast came from them against me, 
now also will I pronounce judgment against them " 
(v. 12). 

The figure which the prophet uses in this verse to 
express the people's unrestrained life of sin was sug- 
gested by the figure of the Sirocco which he employed 
in the preceding verses in describing the impending 
destruction. 

The concluding words, "now also will I pronounce 
judgment against them," call up immediately another 
vision of the coming judgment, and with this the 
second part begins : 

"Behold, he cometh up like clouds, 
his chariots are like the whirlwind, 
his horses are swifter than eagles — 
Woe unto us! we are undone " (v. 13). 

After this climax the prophet pauses very effectively 
to exhort the people to halt in their downward 
course; — but only for a moment, then he takes up anew 
his dramatic description of the approach of the enemy : 

"0 Jerusalem! cleanse thy heart from wickedness 

that thou mayest be saved ! 

How long wilt thou harbor within thee thy evil 

thoughts? 
Hark! a messenger from Dan, 
a bearer of evil news from Mt. Ephraim: 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 199 

Tell all the people, 'There [they] are!' 

Proclaim in Jerusalem, the besiegers 

have arrived from a distant land, 

they shout at the cities of Judah the war-cry. 1 

Like guards in the field they have closed her in round 

about, 
because she hath been rebellious against me, saith the 

Lord. 
Thy ways and thy doings have brought this upon thee. 
This is the fruit of thy wickedness. 
Yea, it is bitter, it toucheth one's heart " 2 (w. 14-18). 

Thus the second part, like the first, closes with a 
brief explanation of the cause of the judgment, with 
the difference, however, that here the prophet adds an 
expression of his personal grief over the situation. 
This note is fully developed in the opening verses of 
the last part: 

"O my innermost being! I writhe in anguish, 
my heart throbs violently, I find no rest. 

1 ki opening verse 15, is introductory ki, as XII, 4c (see supra, 
p. 188). Note the vividness of the description — the messenger from 
Mt. Ephraim following closely on the heels of the herald from Dan. 
Verse 16 states what news they convey. This latter verse is perfect 
and, with the exception of the reading birusalaim (LXX) or llrul. 
(Pes.) instead of 'aljerils., needs no emendation, gqjim has here the 
meaning "all the people," just as 'ammim Job. XVII, 6, and l e, ummim 
Prov. XXIV, 24; the meaning "tell" which hizklr has here cannot be 
questioned, since the word occurs in Gen. XL, 14 with the meaning 
"mention" and in Is. LXIH, 7 and in Ps. LXXVII, 12 (K) with the 
meaning "relate." hinrie forms an ellipsis, the subject being omitted. 
The ellipsis adds greatly to the vividness of the scene; grammatically 

l it is to be explained by the fact that hinne is primarily verbum sub- 
stantivum. 

2 The suffix of the 2d sing, of libbekh is impersonal, as, e. g., in bd' a khd 
'azzd (Jud. VI, 4), bo'«kha siir (I Sam. XV, 7). 



200 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

For my soul heareth 1 but the sound of the trumpet, 

the alarm of war. 
Destruction meeteth destruction, 2 
Yea, the whole country is ravaged, 
all of a sudden my tents are destroyed, 
in an instant my tent-hangings [are destroyed]. 
How long must I behold the standard, 
must I hear the sound of the trumpet?" (vv. 19-21). 

In answer to the question of the prophet, how long 
his agony must last, God points to the people's hope- 
less corruption, their utter mental and spiritual blind- 
ness, whereupon the prophet again takes up the thread 
of igb-21, and develops in detail his vision of the 
destruction of the country: 

"For my people are foolish, they know me not, 
stupid children they are, lacking understanding, 
they are cunning in doing evil, but know not how to do 

good. 
I look to the earth, and there is chaos and void, 
to the sky, and its luster is gone; 
I behold the mountains tottering and all the hills 

shaking; 
I look about, and there are no people, 
even the birds of the sky are scared away; 
I look about, and the fruitful country is turned to a 

wilderness, 
all its cities are destroyed, 
because of God, because of His fierce anger " (vv. 

22-26). 

1 Read the participle, somaath, in accordance with the LXX, Pes. 
and Targ. 

2 nigra is not Nifal of qard, "tell," but of qard, byform of qard with 
he. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 201 

In vv. 27a and 28 the prophet develops the idea 
contained in the concluding words of the preceding 
v. 26, and accounts at the same time for the dread 
pictures of his vision — God's decree of judgment is 
irrevocable : 

"For thus saith the Lord, 
the whole land shall be made desolate; 1 
therefore must the land mourn, and even 
the sky above will be cast in gloom; 
because I have spoken, and will not repent, 
I have resolved, and will not retract." 

There is nothing eschatological about Jeremiah's 
vision of the coming doom in vv. 2$&. (Gressmann to 
the contrary) ? "The sky above will be cast in gloom " 
of v. 28 and "its luster is gone" of v. 23 have a very 
simple explanation. It is a universally recognized 
fact that in periods of great grief we are prone to pro- 
ject our own gloom into the natural scenes and 
objects surrounding us; it seems hardly conceivable 
that nature should continue her course unaffected 
by our sorrow. 

Verses 29-31 are the finale. The prophet returns 
very skilfully to the starting-point of his whole 
description, the people's flight from the enemy con- 
quering the country: 

"At the sound of the horsemen and the archers 
the whole city 3 hath taken to flight, 

1 27b, w e khald Id 'ae^scz, "yet will I not wreak complete destruc- 
tion," it is obvious, is an interpolation. It purports to moderate God's 
declaration in v. 27a, which, however, it flatly contradicts. 

2 See " Der Ursprung der israelitisch-judischen Eschatologie," 
p. 147. 

3 The capital, no doubt, is meant; the LXX read ha'araes. 



202 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

they retreat to the woods, climb the rocks, 

every city x is deserted, none is left in them" (v. 29). 

He continues with an apostrophe to the nation, in 
which he mingles irony with sadness as he tells her 
that she cannot avert her doom by any wiles : 

"But thou, doomed to ruin, 2 why dost thou endeavor 
to clothe thyself in scarlet, to deck thyself 
with golden jewelry, to enlarge thine eyes with stib- 
ium; 
in vain dost thou make thyself fair, 
the lovers scorn thee, they seek thy life " (v. 30). 

"They seek thy life" leads over in turn to a graphic 
description of the nation in her death-struggle, which 
forms at once the climax and the conclusion of the 
whole : 

"Yea, I hear sounds as of a woman in travail, 

cries of anguish as of a woman giving birth to her 

first-born : 
It is the cry of the daughter of Zion, 
that gaspeth for breath, that throweth up her hands: 3 
Woe unto me! My life doth succumb unto mur- 
derers!" (v. 31). 

This sermon ranks next to the confessions in 
importance, in that it so admirably portrays the con- 

1 Read kol c ir as bahen demands and as the LXX in fact read. 

2 Read ledudd; the mistake arose from the fact that the feminine 
was written abbreviated: 'THS?. s e dildd is potential participle as in 
Ps. CXXXVII, 8, where the text has unnecessarily been amended 
by recent exegetes. 

■ That is, in her death-agony. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 203 

flict of feelings which was constantly being waged in 
Jeremiah's soul. Jeremiah knew that his people were 
past hope, he knew that they would not repent, that 
they could not be saved, and that, therefore, as far as 
they were concerned, his preaching was in vain. But 
he could not reconcile his love for his people to the 
thought of their destruction. The very knowledge 
that their doom was inevitable made the thought of it 
torture; and the fact that he loved them so deeply 
made it impossible for him to get the thought out of 
his mind. His people were rushing blindly, uncon- 
sciously, to their doom and he was powerless to stay 
them. With preternatural keenness his brain worked 
out again and again every circumstance and detail of 
his people's destruction. Yet his heart cried out for 
the impossible, that God might suspend His judgment, 
that His people might yet be saved. This conflict of 
feelings explains how the prophet comes to break 
off in the very middle of his vision of the approaching 
catastrophe to exhort his indifferent hearers to repent 
while there is yet time. It is important to note that 
similar expression is given to these conflicting feelings 
in Chap. VI (cf. v. 8 and also 10a and 15a) — a sermon 
which in structure and tenor is almost the exact 
counterpart of IV, 3-31, though in dramatic effect and 
vividness of description it does not come up to the 
level of the latter. The circumstance that both 
sermons belong unquestionably to the oldest products 
of Jeremiah's activity lends them a special signifi- 
cance for our purpose, inasmuch as it shows that from 
the very first Jeremiah believed the doom inevitable. 1 

1 If in the face of such depth of feeling, such grief and gloom, as are 
revealed in Chaps. IV, 3-31 and VI, Cornill speaks of the averting of 
the Scythian danger as "schwere Tage fur den jugendlichen Pro- 



204 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Besides the above sermons, there are two pas- 
sages that call for discussion, XXXVI, 3 and 7, and 
XVIII, iff. 

4. xxxvi, 3, 7; chaps, xxv and xlv 
(a) xxxvi, 3, 7 

At first glance it would seem to follow from XXXVI, 
3 and 7 that when, after the battle at Karkemish, 
Jeremiah had Baruch write down all his prophecies 
and read them to the people, he did it in the hope that 
a conversion of the people might yet be effected. 
On closer examination, however, this conclusion does 
not appear permissible. The particle, 'ittai, does not 
necessarily express what the writer or speaker hopes 
may occur, or what he thinks is likely to occur. It is 
often used to state a purely conjectural case, a con- 
tingency which he knows is unlikely to occur; 1 
cf. Is. XL VII, 12, J ulai tukTtfli ho'tl 'illai ta' a rosi, 
"If perchance," or better, "If by any chance thou 
mightst be able to achieve anything, if by any 

pheten," die "erste schwere Enttauschung," die moglicherweise 
"lahmend auf ihn eingewirkt hat" und durch die "sein Glaube auf 
eine harte Probe gestellt" wurde (op. tit., p. 85 and Einleitung, p. 
XXVII), it but shows how he failed to enter into the spirit of these 
singular sermons. Cornill's reasoning here is the more surprising as in 
his excellent exposition on Chap. XLV he remarks aptly in regard to 
Jeremiah's mission's being at constant strife with his affection for his 
people: "War doch sein ganzes prophetisches Wirken ein fortgesetz- 
ter Kampf gegen das eigene mitfiihlende Herz, welches in ihm tobte 
und ihm die Brust zersprengen wollte, so dass er wunschen konnte 
niemals geboren zu sein." 

1 This use of 'illai is even more in keeping with its etymology; the 
word is really a double conditional particle, this formation being 
intended, no doubt, to lend greater emphasis to the conjectural case. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 205 

chance thou mights t scare off [the catastrophe]," * Jer. 
LI, 8, 'ulai teraphe, "If by any chance she might be 
healed." 2 And it is with this force that 'ulai is used in 
Jer. XXXVI, 3 and 7, as the contents of these verses 
clearly show: Verse 3, it may be well to point out, does 
not read jism ei u 'aeth d e bhari or d e bhar jahwce, " . . . 
hear my word" or "the word of God," as is customary 
in such cases, and as one would naturally expect here 
also, but significantly j is m ci u 'aeth kara'd, "... hear 
the evil," etc., this evil being none other than the very 
peril which is staring them in the face and which has 
rilled them with such alarm; and v. 7 concludes with 
the categorical statement that God's judgment has 
been decreed. The verses are to be translated: "If by 
any chance Judah might hear all the evil which I 
purpose to do unto them so that they might return 
from their evil ways, 3 and I might forgive their in- 
iquities 4 and their sins. 4 — If by any chance their 
prayers might be offered up unto God and they might 

1 The customary explanation, that "scare off" means "scare off the 
demon believed to be instrumental in the destruction," is farfetched 
and quite unnecessary. This is just another interesting illustration of 
the grammatical case pointed out, pp. 51 and 182, n. 3. The sub- 
ject of the preceding sentence, so' a or ra a of v. 11, is to be supplied 
as object of taarosi. 

2 Since Brown, Driver, Briggs' "Hebrew English Lexicon," s. V; 
'ulai, explains the use of 'ulai in these two examples by remarking 
"in mockery," it may be well to point out that the fact that the au- 
thors use irony in these passages does not in the least explain the 
function of 'ulai from a grammatical point of view. The grammatical 
function of 'ulai in the above cases and in certain others, which cannot 
be taken up here, has its analogy in certain uses of Greek av with the 
optative. 

3 In accordance with the LXX, read middarkam (plural) and omit 
'is. 

* Read the plural in accordance with the versions. 



206 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

return from their evil ways, 1 for great is the anger and 
fury which God has pronounced against this people." 
Thus the verses express a most despondent view of the 
situation rather than confidence that a turn for the 
better might be effected. Even when the people 
trembled for their existence, and in their fear ordained 
a day of fast and penance throughout the country, 
Jeremiah cherished no hope that they would come to 
see the peril in the light of his preaching "and turn 
from their evil ways." On the contrary, their zealous 
resort to ceremonial piety, whenever danger threat- 
ened or disaster befell them, their blind belief that they 
could appease God and induce His good will by ritu- 
alistic observances were for Jeremiah, even as for the 
other prophets, the proof that by nothing short of 
their destruction could they be made to realize the 
hollowness and mockery of their religious customs and 
beliefs. 2 Jer. XXXVI, 3 and 7, then, although for the 
question occupying us here they cannot claim equal 
value with the sermons and confessions — inasmuch as, 
being a part of a biographic record, they do not express 
the prophet's thoughts and feelings so immediately — 
corroborate none the less what everyone of his sermons 
and confessions shows, viz., that at no period of his 
preaching did Jeremiah expect that his words would 
produce a change of heart in his contemporaries. 

(b) chap, xxv 

The interpretation just given of XXXVI, 3 and 7 
receives additional support from the direct utterances 

1 Read the plural in accordance with the versions. 

2 Besides the Temple-sermon and IV, si., cf. particularly Am. 
IV, 4-12, Is. I, 2-20, XXIX, 1-4, 5C-6, 9-14, Hos. V,6,and see infra, 
Book II, Part I. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 207 

of Jeremiah which date from the time of his life with 
which that chapter deals, viz., Chap. XXV and Chap. 
XLV — utterances the testimony of which is the more 
pertinent as they are immediately connected with 
Jeremiah's committing his prophecies to writing. 
From Chap. XXV (part of which served as introduc- 
tion, part as conclusion to the reading of his prophe- 
cies by Baruch, see supra, pp. 46ff.) we know that 
Jeremiah's sole object in having his prophecies com- 
mitted to writing and read to the people was to estab- 
lish the fact that his past preaching was vindicated by 
the recent events at Karkemish, and to make it clear 
that his prophesying was inspired by God (see supra, 
pp. 172L). This chapter contains no hint of admoni- 
tion, no suggestion of a possible escape from the 
judgment; it shows the prophet's mind altogether 
preoccupied with the thought of the destruction 
which he sees so swiftly approaching from Babylon. 

(c) CHAP. XLV 

Chapter XLV furnishes even more convincing proof 
that Jeremiah had abandoned all hope for the nation 
before he committed his prophecies to writing, and 
that, consequently, he cannot have aimed at effecting 
a conversion of the people by this means. According 
to v. 1, the utterance recorded in this chapter was 
made on the occasion of his dictating his prophecies to 
Baruch, in the fourth year of Jehojakim's reign; and 
that this really was the date and occasion of it Cornill, 
in his exposition of the chapter, referred to above, has 
conclusively proved. The utterance is addressed to 
Baruch: — Baruch, weighed down by his grief and 
despair at the disclosure of Jeremiah's prophecies, 
has asked if all hope must be relinquished, if there is 



208 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

no prospect of rest, if there is nothing to be looked 
forward to but endless misery and woe; and Jeremiah, 
who well understands the feelings of loyalty and love 
which have prompted Baruch's passionate question- 
ing, and who, no doubt, would give comfort if he 
could, replies that God's decree of judgment is un- 
alterable — He is to overthrow and destroy what 
His own hands have planted and builded, and the 
evil which He is to bring will overtake all. 1 The only 
hope he holds out to Baruch is that he may escape 
with his life. 

5. xviii, iff 

There would be no necessity here for a consideration 
of XVIII, iff., were it not for the reason that this 
passus has frequently been referred to in support of 
the view that the prophets' predictions of judgment 
have not the value of absolute declarations, but only 
of conditional ones ; 2 as a matter of fact, in their present 
context, these verses point to the opposite conclusion. 
In XVIII, 1-10 Jeremiah simply states outright 
what follows by inference from all his preaching, and 
from the preaching of the other prophets as well, 
viz., that, in the case of the people's sincerely repent- 
ing, God's judgment might at any time be stayed, 
even as God's promises would not ensure immunity 
for a people, should this people subsequently fall into 
sinful ways. But that Jeremiah entertained no hope 
whatever that the people might yet repent is shown by 

*As in XXV, 31, which originated simultaneously with XLV, 
kol basar connotes "all people; " cf. supra, p. 49, n. 1. 

2 Among others, by Giesebrecht, "Die Berufsbegabung der Alttes- 
tamentlichen Propheten," p. 82, and E. Kautzsch, "Biblische Thao- 
logie des Alten Testaments," pp. 202 and 256. 



JEREMIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 209 

the fact that he follows up vv. 1-10 with the emphatic 
declaration that they are hopelessly corrupt. And, 
granted even that the declaration, vv. 11 and 12, 
formed no original part of 1-10, the latter, even then, 
would not permit the inference which Giesebrecht 
and others draw from it — in proof of which we may 
appeal from Giesebrecht to Giesebrecht. For in that 
case the most likely interpretation of vv. 1-10 — as 
Giesebrecht in fact acknowledges in his Commentary 
by so interpreting them — would be that Jeremiah's 
chief object in this discourse was to assail the people's 
blind trust in God's promises of the past. 

It may be well to point out further that, suggestive 
as is Cornill's reasoning in regard to the insight which 
came to Jeremiah on that day that he watched the 
potter at his work, 1 it is quite excluded that, originally, 
the utterance consisted of the narrative part, vv. 1-4, 
only, and that all that follows is but the "edifying" 
comment of a later author. For if that were the case, 
not only would Jeremiah be leaving his hearers or 
readers altogether in the dark as to what truth had 
been revealed to him by the potter's moulding of 
the clay into a definite shape — he would be making 
no intimation that any truth whatever had been re- 
vealed to him, beyond the common and well-known 
details of the craft. Though it is possible that the 
continuation, vv. 5fL, as it has come down to us, 
is not altogether Jeremiah's work, but was tampered 
with by later authors, it may be maintained with 
certainty that at least vv. 5 and 6 are authentic. It 
is not at all likely that the continuation was limited, as 
Erbt believes, 2 to these two verses, as this would 
give it a decidedly unfinished character, but it is im- 

1 Op. cit., ad loc. 2 Op. cit., pp. I56ff. 



210 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

possible to distinguish with any certainty just what is 
original of vv. 7-12 and what is a later addition. 
This point is, however, altogether irrelevant for our 
purpose, as the piece in no case leaves room for the 
deduction that the prophets hoped the doom might 
yet be averted. When Cornill in his interpretation of 
vv. 1-4 remarks: " If we now ask to what circum- 
stances and to what time verses 1-4 point, the answer 
can only be: to the time when Jeremiah still thought 
the warding off of the doom possible, when he hoped 
that God's grace would ultimately find ways and 
means to guide his people in the right path and to 
save it," 1 he overlooks the fact that the salient point 
of the simile is, "And if the vessel on which he was 
working got spoiled in his hands, 2 he made it into 
another one " — that is to say, degenerate Israel, "the 
worthless vessel," as Hosea called it, 3 must give way 
to a new Israel, to the future, regenerate Israel, 
which is to rise out of the ruins of the present nation. 

1 Op. cit., p. 222. 

2 b e jadau, as is to be read in accordance with the LXX and Vulg. 
instead of kahomaer Wjad hajjoser, which by an oversight of a copyist 
may have got into the text here from v. 6. 

3 Hos. VIII, 8. 



CHAPTER IV 
AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 

I. THE DOMINANT NOTE OF AMOS' PREACHING — THE 
CERTAINTY OE JUDGMENT 

In spite of the marked difference in temperament 
and individuality which Amos presents to Jeremiah, 
in spite of the resultant contrast between the intimate 
self-analysis, the emotional tenderness, the dramatic 
changes of feeling, which abound in Jeremiah's writ- 
ings, and the vigorous, uncompromising, sternly im- 
personal tone which characterizes the prophecies of 
Amos, there is, nevertheless, a fundamental point of 
contact between the two prophets. Both prophets, 
Amos no less than Jeremiah, looked upon the doom as 
inevitable. This conviction it was that produced the 
pathetic questionings, the gloomy self-communings, 
the ever-present sorrow, which fill the pages of Jere- 
miah; and it is this same certainty of judgment 
that gives the writings of Amos the austere, relent- 
less character, which has misled many of his critics 
into thinking him devoid of human sympathy and all 
the softer emotions. With this basal thought, that 
the nation is to perish, Amos dramatically opens his 
utterances : 

"Yhwh shall storm 1 from Zion and thunder from 
Jerusalem, 

1 The customary translation oljiVag, "shall roar," is inaccurate, 
for the phrase jakwcsjiVag here has its origin not in the comparison of 

211 



212 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

and the pastures of the shepherds shall mourn, 
and the summit of Karmel shall wither " (I, 2). 

This thought forms the motive, as it were, which runs 
through his entire preaching, swelling out more 
strongly in each successive part, until, in the shrill 
dissonance of the last one, it reaches a climax. At 
this point, the thought of the ruin about to overtake 
his people has gained such sway over his mind that, 
for the time being, it is a reality for him, and he 
describes how he sees God approaching to destroy 
Israel. 1 

2. CHAP. V, I-17 (rECONSTRUED) CORROBORATES 
THIS VIEW 

Those scholars who hold that Amos' sentence of 
destruction was meant to be understood as conditional 
only, that to the very last he hoped that a conversion 
of the people might be effected, 2 and those who take 

Yhwh with a lion, but in the popular notion that saw in the thunder- 
storm a manifestation of Yhwh; with the same meaning as here 
jis'ag occurs again Job XXXVII, 4, where it is used synonymously 
with jar em, just as here with, jitten qolo. 

1 The Messianic appendix, Am. IX, 80-15, which looks upon the 
downfall not as prospective nor as sure to happen, but as an actually 
existing state of affairs (cf. vv. 11 and 14!), is not the work of Amos, 
the great majority of the critics agree, but the product of later, exilic, 
or more likely, postexilic, times. For a fuller discussion of the reasons 
which preclude Amos' authorship of this present close of his book, 
cf., among others, G. A. Smith, "The Twelve Prophets," I, 189- 
195, Harper, "Amos and Hosea," 1951!., Nowack, "Die Kleinen 
Propheten," 1721!. and "Die Zukunftshoffnungen Israels in der 
Assyrischen Zeit " (in "Theologische Abhandlungen " gewidmet 
H. J. Holtzmann), pp. 381!., and Marti, " Das Dodekapropheton," 
pp. 2241!. 

2 See Giesebrecht, "Die Berufsbegabung der Alttestamentlichen 
Propheten," p. 83, Volz, " Die Vorexilische Yahveprophetie und der 
Messias," p. 17, E. Kautzsch, op. ciL, pp. 201 and 254. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 513 

the view that, at least at the beginning of his preaching, 
he reckoned with such a possibility, 1 cite in proof of 
their views V, 4-6, i4f. On closer examination, how- 
ever, these passages yield a very different conclusion. 
That they seem to support the view that Amos' pre- 
diction of judgment was not "wholly unconditional " 
is due to the fact that the piece, V, 1-17, as is widely 
recognized, has not come down to us in the order in 
which the verses originally followed one another. 
Their original order seems to me to have been as 
follows: vv. 1-6, 14-15, 12, 7, 10, 13, 11, 16-17. 2 
Thus rearranged, V, 1-17 show not only a logical 
sequence of thought throughout, but a highly effective 
unity of structure. A translation of the whole, in the 
order indicated, will bear this out: 

V, 1 "Hear this word which I recite 

as dirge over you, O House of Israel: 

2 Fallen is the virgin Israel — 
powerless to rise again, 
prostrated to the ground — 
no one to lift her up. 

3 For thus saith the Lord God, 

of the city that hath been wont to march to 

battle 
a thousand strong, a hundred shall remain, 
and of that one which hath been wont to march 

to battle 
a hundred strong, ten shall remain. 3 

1 See Meinhold, op. cit., pp. 43ff.; Harper, op. cit., p. CXX; and 
Staerk, op. cit., p. 14. 

2 The doxology, vv. 8-9, modern scholars agree, is a later addition. 

3 The stylistically objectionable l e bheth jisra 'el is, as Guthe and 
Sievers rightly point out, a gloss (see "Amos metrisch erlautert," 



214 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

4 1 Thus saith the Lord to the House of Israel, 
if ye sought me ye would live, 

5 and sought not Beth-El and frequented not 
Gilgal and made not pilgrimage to Beer- 

Sheba: — 
Yea, 2 Gilgal must wander into exile, 
and Beth-El shall perish. 

6 If ye sought God ye would live — 

[There is great fear] that fire will burst forth 
on the House of Joseph and consume it, 
there being none able to extinguish it. 3 

14 Seek good and not evil that ye may live, 
and that the Lord, God Sabaoth, may 
be really 4 with you as ye believe. 

15 Hate evil and love good 

pp. 11 and 63L, and Kautzsch, 3 ad loc). The glossator's object in 
adding the phrase, Guthe thinks, may have been to point out to the 
reader that the decimation applied to Israel and not also to Judah. 

1 kl is introductory ki, and is used here, as frequently elsewhere, in 
passing over to a new thought. 

2 kl is emphatic kl. 

3 paen jislah cannot be dependent on dirsujahwce, since the latter 
is virtually subordinate to wih e ju, but is to be classed with the seem- 
ingly independent sentences introduced by paen. The case belongs 
properly in the category of elliptical sentences, the governing clause or 
phrase, expressing fear, anxiety or despair, being omitted. Instead of 
ka'es read ba'es; the meaning of jislah ba'es "be kindled" or "be 
fanned into conflagration " is borne out by Sir. VIII, 10 — see Margolis 
in "American Journal of Semitic Languages," XVII, 131, and Ges.- 
Buhl, "Worterbuch" s. v.; but contrary to the opinion of these two 
scholars, the phrase is to be taken as having intransitive force, salah 
being an intransitive verb. TJbheth'el (for which the LXX read 
l e bheth jisra'el) is superfluous {cf. Is. I, 31, Jer. IV, 4, XXI, 12), and 
betrays itself by its l e as a late gloss. 

4 ken here is not the adverb ken, but the verbal adjective ken, 
forming a casus adverbialis; cf. I Ki. I, 37, ken jornar jahwce, "may 
God prove it true," or "verify it," and Ps. CXXVI, 2, ken jitten 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 215 

and establish justice in the court of justice — 
peradventure God might show mercy unto 
decimated Joseph. 

12 For I know that your iniquities are many, 

and your sins numerous, • 
ye that oppress the innocent, accept bribes, 
and deny justice to the poor : in the court of 

justice; 
7 ye that turn justice into wormwood, 
and drag righteousness to the ground. 

10 They hate him that stands up for the right in 

the law-court, 2 
and detest him that speaks uprightly. 

13 Therefore the prudent keep silent in such a time, 
for it is an evil time. 

1 1 Therefore, because ye trample 3 upon the poor, 
and levy a tax of grain on them, 

the houses which ye have built 
with quarried stone ye shall not inhabit; 
nor shall ye drink the wine 
of the pleasant vineyards which ye have 
planted. 

lidido send, where ken has the force of an expletive, "truly," "verily": 
"Verily He giveth his beloved sleep." 

1 'aebkjonim is elliptical for mispat 'aebhjonim, the full phrase 
occurs Ex. XXIII, 6; cf. also Deut. XXVII, 19, Ther. Ill, 35, and 
daeraekh ca nawimjattu Am. n, 6. 

2 bassaar is qualificative of mokhl a h, as correctly taken by Guthe 
(in Kautzsch 3 ) and by Harper, op. cit. 

3 Read DDD^ instead of D3DBH21 or DDD^te, as some MSS. 
read. The mistake is easily explained: D2D12 was written, in 
the manner of the Aramaic, with 8P; at some later time the correction 
D was made between the lines, and when the MS. was recopied, the 
copyist, either mechanically, or because he did not know better, 
copied the W as well as the superlinear correction, D. 



216 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

16 Therefore thus saith the Lord, God Sabaoth, 
in all places there will be wailing, 

and in all the streets people will cry: Woe! Woe! 
The husbandmen will call 
the professional wailers 1 to mourning and 
wailing. 

17 Even all vineyards will resound the wailing 
when I march through your midst, saith the 

Lord. 

It will be noticed that the above rearrangement of 
V, 1-17 2 has in common with Marti's rearrangement 
of them 3 that it places vv. 14-15 after vv. 4-6, but 
differs from it in that it does not take V, 1-17 as three 
separate pieces or fragments, viz., (a) 1-3; (b) 4-6, 
14-15; (c) 7, 10-13 (exclusive of v. 13), 16-17, Dut 
shows them to be consecutive parts of one harmonious 
whole. 

The piece opens with a dirge over the nation that 
God has destroyed — so real to the prophet is the 
disaster he foresees. This is followed up logically in 
v. 3 with the explanation of how the catastrophe is to 
be brought about: the nation will suffer utter defeat 
in battle, only a tenth of the army will remain. The 
close of the piece (vv. 16-17) harmonizes with this 
beginning in the picture it contains of the universal 
mourning which will prevail throughout the land on 
the day of doom. 4 

1 Read, as Sievers and Guthe emend, l e jod e 'e naehi instead of 'eel 
jod e 'e naehi. 

2 1 presented this rearrangement in my class-lectures on Amos as far 
back as 1902. 

3 See op. cit., pp. 187ft. 

4 It would not be necessary to mention that nothing whatever is 
implied as to the nature of the threatening catastrophe in ki 'ae'^bhor 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 217 

In the intervening verses 4-15, as rearranged above, 
the prophet takes up the transgressions and omissions 
which have made Israel's doom certain, and his dirge 
over them timely. This middle part is composed of 
four subparts of unequal length, (a) 4-5, (b) 6, (c) 14- 
15, (d) 12, 7, 10, 13, n, each of which is but a variation 
of the same theme, the necessity for judgment, and 
each of which closes with another picture of the ca- 
tastrophe, which is described at length in the intro- 
duction and conclusion of the whole. In this way the 
separate subparts are clearly bound both to one 
another and to the introduction and conclusion. 

Amos begins this explanation of the judgment by 
pointing out how it might have been averted: — they 

b e qirb e kha 'amar jahwce, v. 17b, were it not for the inferences which 
Gressmann and others draw from this half-verse (see "Die Schriften 
des Alten Testaments in Auswahl iibersetzt und erklart," II, 1, 
p. 347). The fact that w^abhartl b e 'aeraes misraim happens to occur 
in the story of the slaying of the first-born of Egypt (see Exod. XII, 1 2) 
evidently led Gressmann to conclude that in Am. V, 16-17 destruction 
by pestilence is presaged, and, accordingly, he takes these verses as a 
separate utterance. The coincidence is, however, quite irrelevant, as 
may be seen from the fact that in Exod. XI, 4 God's passing through 
Egypt to slay the first-born is expressed by >a nijose b e thokh misraim, 
and that jasa, both with and without the preposition b e or any other 
prepositional complement (similarly 'abhor jahwce, Exod. XII, 23 
has no prepositional complement), is used as technical term for 
"marching to battle" in regard to God as well as to man (cf. e. g., 
Is. XLII, 13, Ps. XLIV, 10, and LX, 12). Furthermore, the phrases 
'abhar b e qaeraebh or 'abhar b e and jasa b e thokh or jasa b e are in them- 
selves equivocal as to the end in view, that is to say, God's passing 
through a place or through the people's midst may be for a beneficent 
just as well as for a calamitous purpose. Proof of this is the synony- 
mous jahwce ,CB lohcekha mithhallekh beqaeraebh maJfnaekha, Deut. 
XXIII, 15, which is followed by " to deliver thee and to surrender thy 
enemies to thee," as also the fact that the synonymous 'ae <iB lce 
bh e qirb e kha occurs in Exod. XXXIII, 5 with a threatening intention, 
while in v. 3 the opposite intention is implied in the phrase. 



218 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

should have sought God, he represents God Himself as 
declaring. But, since the people have been most 
assiduous in visiting the sanctuaries and performing 
the ritual, and have no conception of any other way of 
worshipping God, the startling explanation is added — 
but not by frequenting the sanctuaries, whether of 
the Northern or of the Southern kingdom. The 
hypothetical force of dirsuni wiJfju and of v. 5a 
(another protasis to wiJfju) follows directly from the 
declaration with which he continues : 

"Yea, Gilgal must wander into exile, and Beth-El 
shall perish." 

This conclusion of the first subpart predicts the 
nation's ruin not less categorically than the dirge 
of vv. 1-3 ; like the latter, it excludes all hope of their 
being saved. 

At the beginning of the second subpart, the prophet, 
in a sudden burst of sympathy, makes a personal ap- 
peal: "If ye sought God, ye would live!" But most 
significant is the exclamation of despair with which he 
immediately follows up this appeal. Certainly Amos 
could not have shown more emphatically that he did 
not expect his words to produce effect. 

Up to this moment Amos has defined only in a 
negative way what the requirement, "seek God," im- 
plies: they should do away with their ritual and cult, 
since this but blinds them to "what God doth require 
of man," as Micah later puts it; but now, in the 
third subpart, he explains positively that to "seek 
God " means nothing more nor less than to "seek good 
and not evil." By so doing they might live, and God 
would be with them even as their lives would be cen- 
tered in Him. Then he still further defines his mean- 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 219 

ing: they must hate evil and love good and establish 
justice in the land— there is hope for them in nothing 
short of a thorough-going change. And, though the 
prophet has grown- visibly more impassioned and 
persuasive, the hypothetical character of this final 
appeal is made not less plain than that of vv. 4-5 by 
the 'illai introducing 15b, 1 and especially by the epi- 
thet s e 'erith Joseph at the end. This epithet (the cus- 
tomary interpretation to the contrary) has no Messi- 
anic or eschatological connotation, like s e, erithjd a qobh, 
Mic. V, 6-7, or ?' erith jisra'el, Jer. XXXI, 7. That 
the prophet refers to the nation as " decimated 
Joseph" is quite in keeping with the funeral song with 
which he opened the piece. In the same way in VI, 
1-6, when scoring the people for their self-complacent 
trust in the increased material prosperity of the 
nation, following Jeroboam's victories over Syria, 
Amos exclaims, "And they are unconcerned over the 
destruction of Joseph" ('al saebhaer Joseph), just as if 
the destruction had already occurred. 

Having thus concluded the third subpart, like the 
preceding ones, with an allusion to their certain de- 
struction, Amos begins the fourth subpart, in vv. 12,7, 
10 (introduced by the causative particle kl), with a 
description of the arch depravity which has made 
their destruction inevitable. Such corruption, where 
honesty has no show, where even the champion of 
right and justice is hated and detested, must be past 
amendment. This thought is succinctly expressed in 
the verse following v. 10, v. 13 : "Therefore the prudent 
keep silent in such a time, for it is an evil time." The 
meaning of this verse is that in a time of such utter 
corruption the prudent man, that is the man of 

1 Cf. the remarks on this particle, supra, pp. 2041". 



220 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

worldly wisdom, keeps silent — not, however, because 
speaking serves to draw hatred and enmity on his 
head, but rather because speaking is futile. 1 Thus 
taken, the argument of the majority of recent exegetes, 
that the policy of silence advanced in this verse is in 
such contradiction to the prophet's own practice and 
spirit that the verse cannot possibly have originated 
with him, does not hold; Amos makes here a mere 
matter of fact statement without passing any judg- 
ment whatever on the moral justification of keeping 
silent. 2 He concludes this last subpart by telling the 
ruling classes, who are principally responsible for the 
prevailing corruption, that the day of reckoning is 
close at hand — ere long they must relinquish their 
ill-gotten wealth. 

The harmony of structure marking this piece 
throughout, is shown in the closing vv. 16-17, m the 
way the leading chord is struck again, and in the way 
these verses effectively supplement v. 1 1 : — the whole 
nation will be involved in the catastrophe; guilty and 
innocent, oppressor and oppressed alike, will be caught 
in the whirlwind of destruction. 

The above analysis shows that, contrary to the pre- 
vailing view, no discrepancy exists between V, 1-3 and 
vv. 4ff. Neither is there any part of V, 1-7, 10-17 
redundant or discordant with the general drift and 

1 Of recent exegetes, Harper {op. cit., ad loc.) is the only one who 
interprets the verse in this way. 

2 There is no ground to maintain, as Volz {op. cit., p. 18), and No- 
wack (in his Kommentar, ad loc.) do, that this verse shows the char- 
acteristics of a later period of literature. The verse is clearly not a 
Mashal. The thought expressed is of so general a nature that it 
might easily find expression in any age, and the maskil, the men of 
worldly wisdom, were no doubt as common in Amos' age as they were 
at the time of the Wisdom-Literature. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 221 

purpose of the piece. Rather the symmetry of struc- 
ture extends even to the smallest details, and this 
quality, combined with the vigorous, fervid, intensely 
individual style, stamps it, when viewed from a 
literary standpoint, as a most finished piece of work, as 
a literary product of the very highest order, 

3. IDENTITY OF THE WRITTEN WITH THE SPOKEN 
PROPHECIES 

Notwithstanding the evidence in Chap. V, 1-17, the 
view that Amos looked upon the doom as inevitable 
would still be open to challenge, if it could be shown 
that the writings of Amos were not the true reproduc- 
tion of his oral message, more particularly, if it could 
be shown that the gloom and sternness which charac- 
terize them were the result of the ill-success of his 
ministry, and not of the hopelessness with which he 
started out on his mission. 1 This, however, cannot 
be shown. The remarks above (pp. 871!*.), regarding 
the relation of the prophets' writings to their oral 
preaching, apply here — the former do not materially 
differ from the latter. The writings of Amos form no 
exception in this respect. Indeed, in their noble 
simplicity of style and structure they show all the 
characteristics of oral delivery, and this, to some 
extent, in a more marked degree even than the writings 
of his successors. As Robertson Smith well remarks, 
"The prophecies of Amos . . . are excellent writing, 
because the prophet writes as he spoke, preserving all 
the effects of pointed oral delivery, with that breath 
of lyrical fervor which lends a special charm to the 

x This view has been advanced by Meinhold, op. tit., pp. 46L, 
Staerk also, op. cit., 14L, inclines to it. 



222 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

highest Hebrew oratory." x Like the other prophetic 
books, Amos' writings, of course, suffered text- 
disturbances, but these disturbances did not creep in 
until some later time, in the course of their transmis- 
sion, and are not due, as W. Riedel 2 and Baumann 3 
sought to explain, to the fact that Amos merely en- 
trusted his prophecies to his disciples for oral tradi- 
tion, and that, when they were later collected from 
memory and committed to writing, fragments only 
were remembered, which the editor arranged in a 
purely mechanical way. The text-disorder in the 
book of Amos, as Marti rightly remarks, 4 does not 
exist by any means to the degree that Baumann 
believes. Leaving aside a couple of minor cases and 
the question of the original place of the narrative, 
VII, 10-17, 1 find, in addition to V, 4-15, only one case 
where a number of verses are clearly out of their origi- 
nal place, viz., VIII, 4-8a. The place of these verses 
seems to me to have been between III, 8 and 9. 
The proof of this, however, does not belong here, but 
in the detailed discussion of the plan and structure of 
the Book of Amos. 5 

4. CHAP. VII, 1-9. HISTORY OF AMOS* CALL — GENERAL 
PLAN OP HIS PROPHECIES 

Moreover, VII, 1-9 furnish direct evidence that it 

1 The "Prophets of Israel," pp. 1 261. I do not hesitate to quote this 
remark of Robertson Smith, although he mentions in connection with 
it, in accordance with his view of the prophetic writings in general, 
that Amos' prophecies were "evidently rearranged for publication, 
and probably shortened from their original spoken form." 

2 "Alttestamentliche Untersuchungen," I, pp. 2iff. 

3 Op. cit., pp. 671. 

4 Op. cit., p. 150. 

6 This discussion will have a place in Vol. II. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 223 

was not the utter lack of response to his message which 
matured Amos' conviction that his people was doomed, 
but that it was this conviction that, in the first place, 
drove him away from his flocks and caused him to 
appear as prophet at Beth-El. This passage is ex- 
tremely important, for it not only relates (vv. 7-9) the 
great vision which formed the turning-point in his life, 
but it portrays very accurately the state of mind which 
preceded and led up to this crisis; — the prophet's 
reflections, his growing fears, the specific facts which 
influenced his reasoning, all are laid bare to us in the 
so-called visions of vv. 1-6. These, unlike vv. 7-9, do 
not represent spiritual experiences of the prophet's, 
but actual events in the external world, viz., visitations 
by locusts and drought, which had taken place, not 
only before Amos' appearance at Beth-El, but even 
before his summons to prophecy. (It should be 
remembered that, even in the vision, VIII, if., the 
prophet has reference, not to an imaginary experience, 
but to the actual sight of a basket of ripe fruit; see 
supra, p. 142). The visitations are identical with 
those enumerated in IV, 6-1 1, of which the prophet 
declared that they were God's warnings to Israel in 
the past to return to Him. — But these warnings had 
been in vain! Too blind to understand the meaning 
which God meant His visitations to convey, the people 
sought to appease His wrath by increased zeal in their 
ceremonial worship, by sacrifices and gifts; and so 
Amos' fears for their future grew evermore, until at 
last he found himself face to face with the awful 
realization that their doom was sealed (VII, 1-9). 
From that time on, however fervently he had inter- 
ceded with God for them before, he was unable to 
pray for them, for he was absolutely convinced that no 



224 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

intercession could stay God's judgment. In view of 
this, it cannot be doubted that Amos started out on his 
mission with a clear vision of the utter hopelessness of 
the situation, that is, as far as the immediate future of 
his people was concerned. 

VII, 1-9, it may be pointed out in passing, furnish 
support for the assertion made in the preceding para- 
graph, that, the few cases of later text-disturbances 
excepted, the Book of Amos is a true reproduction of 
Amos' preaching at Beth-El. These verses are held by 
some to have formed the opening of Amos' preaching, 1 
but this is excluded, inasmuch as they presuppose 
IV, 4-1 1, from which they derive their point. Their 
only logical place is where they stand at present, after 
Chaps. I-VI, and where there is every reason to 
suppose Amos himself placed them. In these chapters, 
which in themselves form a logically connected whole, 
the prophet sets forth the necessity of judgment in 
view of the people's hopeless corruption; he dwells 
particularly on the fact that both their religious delu- 
sions and their false interpretation of their material 
prosperity preclude the possibility of a change for the 
better. This objective side of his preaching he follows 
up by what may appropriately be considered its 
subjective side: VII, 1-9; the vision, VIII, 1-2, with 
its tripartite sequel, 3, 9-10, 13-14; 2 and the closing 
vision, IX, 1-4. These in their turn form a no less 
marked unity than Chaps. I-VI: VII, 1-9, as just 

iSee Harper, op. cit., CVIII, and H. P. Smith, "Old Testament 
History," p. 211. Equally excluded is the view of G. A. Smith and 
others that VII, 1-9 together with VIII, 1-3 formed the sole contents 
of Amos' preaching at Beth-El; see G. A. Smith, op. cit., pp. 1071!., 
120, 180. 

2 Verses 11-12 I take to be a fragment of the original conclusion of 
the book. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 225 

noted, give the history of his call; and the two visions 
following describe his state of mind since his people's 
doom has been revealed to him — his complete pre- 
occupation with the thought of the judgment awaiting 
them. 



NATION 

The theory has repeatedly been advanced, both by 
critics who believe his predictions absolute and by 
such as consider them conditional, that Amos' predic- 
tions of doom applied to the Northern Kingdom only; 
and this, if it were true, would rob of a great part of 
its significance the conclusion just deduced from the 
analysis of the Book of Amos, that the prophet be- 
lieved the doom absolutely certain. Meinhold, in 
particular, has urged this view, advancing as reason 
that Amos hoped that his home-country, Judah, 
would not be affected at all by the catastrophe, but 
that the YHWH-religion would there be continued 
without any disruption. 1 Others, though they 
consider it unlikely, if not altogether excluded, that 
Amos reckoned with such a possibility as this, still 
hold that his preaching and prediction of judgment 
are concerned altogether with the Northern Kingdom, 
and nowhere apply to the conditions and fate of 
Judah. 2 In reality, however, as has repeatedly been 
pointed out, 3 the Book of Amos leaves room for 

1 Op. cit., pp. 47ff. 

2 See among others O. Seesemann, "Israel und Juda bei Amos und 
Hosea," pp. iff; Marti, op. cit., pp. 150, 157!:., 172 and 198; and No- 
wack, op. cit., pp. 137, 154 and 159. 

3 Cf. particularly Giesebrecht's review of Meinhold, "Studien 
zur israelitischen Religionsgeschichte," in Theologische Literatur- 
zeiPung, XXIX (1904), 6f.; also Smend, op. cit., p. 181, n. 1, Volz, op. 



ii 



226 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

neither of these views. They can be sustained only by 
arbitrarily eliminating several passages the genuine- 
ness of which is unassailable, and by wrongly interpret- 
ing another. 

In the first place, it would be difficult to explain 
satisfactorily why Amos should have believed that 
Judah would be exempt from judgment. The social 
and religious conditions, on the ground of which Amos 
predicted judgment at Beth-El, were essentially the 
same in Judah as in Northern Israel — the same 
venal greed and corruption of the worldly as well as of 
the religious leaders, the same perversion of justice, 
the same riotous living on the part of the rich, the same 
exploitation of the needy prevailed there as here, as the 
preaching of Isaiah (two decades or less later than that 
of Amos and simultaneous in part with that of Hosea) 
shows. Above all, there prevailed in Israel and Judah 
alike the same ritualistic piety and the same delusions 
about the relation existing between Yhwh and Is- 
rael, both of which Amos assailed as blinding the 
people to what he considered the essential truth — 
the truth that Yhwh is the universal God of righteous- 
ness who demands of all men obedience to His eternal 
laws of justice and humanity. 1 This being the case, it 

cit., p. 19. Harper, op. cit., pp. CXXXI, n. 2, 66, 143, and Staerk, 
op. cit., pp. 172. 

1 In view of the fact that Amos' and to a still greater extent Hosea 's 
condemnation of the cult is represented by various scholars as if 
it were directed not so much against the cult per se as against the 
Kanaanitish-pagan character of the same, and in view of the further 
fact that those who hold this view reason that this character of the 
YHWH-cult was particularly in evidence in the sanctuaries of the 
Northern Kingdom, and that it was for this reason that Amos as well 
as Hosea preached there, it may be well to point out that the YHWH- 
cult as practised in the Temple of Jerusalem was no less thoroughly 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 227 

is not possible to reconcile a belief that Judah would be 
exempt from judgment with Amos' unbending char- 
acter and penetrating mind, animated only by the 
passion for truth and righteousness. 

Further, if Amos had thought that the wave of war, 
which he believed would sweep over Syria and Pales- 
tine and destroy the countries immediately adjoin- 
ing Judah — not only those to the north but also those 
to the east and west — if he had thought that this 
wave would in some remarkable way stop at the 
borders of Judah, it may reasonably be assumed that 
he would not have failed to make this clear by some 
statement to that effect. 

The fact of the matter is, however, that Amos 
significantly opens his preaching by declaring that the 
result of Yhwh's manifestation for judgment will 
be the destruction of the whole country, from the 
pasture-lands in the extreme south to the summit of 
Mt. Karmel in the north (I, 2). Amos' authorship of 
this verse cannot be questioned. 1 The fact that the 
first part of the verse, the sentence, "Yhwh shall 
storm from Zion and thunder from Jerusalem," occurs 
verbatim in Joel IV, 16 is altogether irrelevant for the 
question of the authorship of the verse as a whole; 
the important point is that this sentence has in Amos 
just the opposite application from that which it has 
in Joel — a fact which points to a conclusion of great 

fused with Kanaanitish-pagan elements than the cult of the other 
sanctuaries throughout the country; not even the worst features of 
pagan religious practices, as the Astarte (Ashera) worship and the 
sacrificing of children, were missing (cf. particularly II Ki. XVI, 3!, 
and XXIII, 6f. and 10 of the report of the reform under Josiah). 
1 The authenticity of the verse is denied by Volz, op. tit., pp. 10X, 
Marti, op. tit., pp. 157L, Harper, op. tit., pp. oX, Guthe, op. tit., 
p. 27, Budde (in ZATW., XXX, pp. 37s.) and others. 



228 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

importance for our understanding of Am. I, 2, and of 
the reoccurrence of the phrase in Joel IV, 16. This 
conclusion is that the sentence was coined neither by 
Amos nor by Joel, but that it is to be classed among the 
stock-phrases of those ages, which, like our stock- 
phrases and expressions to-day (not to talk of our 
proverbs), might be used by any number of authors 
independently of one another. 1 The sentence when 
first coined was meant to voice the belief in the 
superiority of Zion to all other YHWH-sanctuaries. 
This superiority accrued to Zion, not because in the 
glorious days of David and Solomon it had been the 
seat and centre of the consolidated kingdom, but 
because of the significance which the Jebusite strong- 
hold with its ancient Kanaanitish sanctuary occupied 
in the history of the conquest of Kanaan. For it was 
not until David succeeded in conquering this strong- 
hold with the old Kanaanitish sanctuary, on the site 
of which the Temple of Jerusalem was built later, 2 
that the Israelites gained complete mastery of the 
country, or — expressed from the point of view of the 
religious beliefs of the times — that Yhwh proved His 
superiority over the Baalim and usurped their place, 
that is to say, became the Baal or Lord of the coun- 

1 Such stock-phrases are often not limited to one nation but are the 
common possession of several nations. A very pertinent illustration 
of the latter case is the phrase, "his fruit above and his roots beneath," 
(pirjo mimma'al w e sarasau mittahath), Am. II, 9, and its variant 
in Is. XXXVII, 31, which, in the latter form, occurs in the Phoenician 
Tomb-Inscription of King Eshmunazar (about 600 B. C). 

2 This significance of Zion is clearly reflected in the legend of the 
foundation of this sanctuary, II Sam. XXIV, I Chron. XXI-XXII, 1, 
as may be proved by a critical analysis of the records. This critical 
analysis, however, cannot be taken up here, but must be reserved for 
separate publication. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 229 

try. It was largely due to this superiority of Zion to 
all other sanctuaries (converted, all of them, at one 
time from Kanaanitish into YHWH-sanctuaries) that 
under Josiah the centralization of the cult was effected; 
for not only the other Judaean sanctuaries beside 
Jerusalem, but also Beth-El, and possibly still other 
sanctuaries of the Northern Kingdom, had retained 
their former sanctity and veneration even after the 
destruction of Samaria, as may be seen from the report 
of Josiah's reformation (cf. II Ki. XXIII, 15 and also 
v. 19), and also from II Ki. XVII, 24-32. 

The idea which was associated in the popular mind 
with the sentence, " Yhwh shall storm from Zion and 
thunder from Jerusalem, " was that, even as at the 
time of the defeat of the Jebusites (see II Sam. V, 
6-10), so, whenever Yhwh would manifest His 
power from His sacred stronghold, Zion, He would 
deal terror and destruction to other nations, but to 
Israel would prove Himself a defender and a champion. 
It is precisely with this application that the sentence is 
used in Joel IV, 16, where it is followed up by the 
declaration, "and heaven and earth shall tremble, 
but to His people He shall prove Himself a refuge, a 
protection to Israel." Amos, however, uses the 
sentence with just the opposite application: the 
result of Yhwh's manifestation from Zion will be 
the ruin of the whole country, the destruction of His 
own people. It is thus obvious that Amos did not 
use the phrase, "Yhwh shall storm from Zion and 
thunder from Jerusalem," because he shared the belief 
in the superiority of Zion or the belief in any of the 
other popular notions associated with the phrase, 
but just the contrary, that he used it for a well- 
calculated effect, to startle his hearers by the un- 



230 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

expected turn with which he continues in the second 
part of the verse. It is this paradoxical turn which 
gives the verse the unmistakable stamp of Amos' 
individuality, for Amos has a way of seizing upon 
current phrases and, discarding the popular notions 
associated with them, of investing them with an al- 
together new and usually contrary meaning. By this 
means he pointedly contrasts his religious views with 
those of the people, as notably here at the opening of 
his preaching, and frequently elsewhere in the course 
of the same (cf. Ill, 2, IV, 4, 1 V, 4L, 2 and 18; also 
V, 15b and VII, 14L may be cited in this connection). 
The conclusion that Amos' prediction of judgment 
is addressed to the whole nation is further confirmed 
by III, 1, where the whole nation is plainly specified: 

"Hear this word that God hath pronounced against 

you, O Israelites, 

against the whole race which I have brought out from 

Egypt." 

Likewise in VI, 1 Amos refers expressly to "those 
who feel secure in Zion," and twice he mentions the 
Judaean sanctuary, Beer-Sheba — in V, 5 in connection 
with Beth-El and Gilgal, and again in VIII, 14 in con- 
nection with Dan and "the guilt of Samaria" (by the 
latter he probably means "the Calf of Samaria"; cf. 
Hos. VIII, 5f.). To eliminate from VI, 1, as some 
would do, "those that feel secure in Zion" would be 
most arbitrary, as, in the course of this piece, Amos 
expressly declares that "the great house and the 

1 "Make pilgrimage to Beth-El and sin, to Gilgal and sin more": 
for Amos' contemporaries their pilgrimage to these sanctuaries was an 
act of piety par excellence. 

2 Cf. supra, p. 218. 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 231 

small house shall alike be reduced to fragments' ' 
(v. 11) — by "the great house and the small house" 
he means Israel and Judah respectively. This in- 
terpretation, which is the one given by the Targum 
and Jerome, and which was generally accepted by 
the older exegetes, is the only possible interpreta- 
tion of habbajith haggadol w e habbajith haqqaton. The 
interpretation which has been favored by recent 
exegetes, 1 viz., that "the great house and the small 
house" are to be understood literally, as mean- 
ing the luxurious houses of the rich and the modest 
houses of the poor, is grammatically untenable. 
Such a meaning could be expressed in Hebrew in two 
ways only — either by the plural, or, more commonly, 
by the singular preceded by kol; for the generic article 
(under which category habbajith haggadol *uf habbajith 
haqqaton would fall if the interpretation at present in 
vogue were correct) is used in Hebrew with class- 
names or names of species and materials only, never 
with common names. 2 Though not an exact analogy, 
the phrase fne bdtte jisra'el, "the two houses of 
Israel," Is. VIII, 14, may well be compared with 
"the great and the small house," used by Amos to 
designate Israel and Judah respectively. 

Since Amos' prediction of judgment, then, is clearly 
addressed to Judah as well as to Israel, the special 
utterance against Judah, II, 4L, being altogether 

1 The older interpretation has been retained by Orelli, Wellhausen, 
Smend, Harper, and Staerk. 

2 It may be well to point out that the only seeming exception where 
bajith, though undefined, occurs with the article, viz., habbajith lasa- 
baeth, I Chron. XVII, 4, is clearly a case of textual mistake, as may be 
seen from the fact that the parallel text, II Sam. VII, 5, reads cor- 
rectly bajith l e Hbhti, and from the further fact that the LXX read the 
latter text also in Chronicles. 



232 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

uncalled for, cannot fail to strike one with suspicion. 
Apart from this, it really betrays itself as the work of 
an interpolater by the fact that, unlike the charges 
against Israel and the surrounding nations, it does not 
point out any one violation of the laws of humanity as 
an example of three and four — i. e., a multitude of 
transgressions — on account of which God's decree of 
judgment is unalterable, but describes Judah's sin in 
such general terms as "They have despised the Law of 
Yhwh and have not observed His statutes," so 
that the introductory formula, " Thus saith the Lord, 
on account of three transgressions of Judah and on 
account of four I shall not revoke it," is seen to be 
meaningless. 

Final proof that II, 4L originated with an interpo- 
later is furnished by the fact that, as in III, 1-8, + 
VIII, 4-8a, x so in II, 6-16 Amos does not address him- 
self to his North -Israeli tish hearers specifically, as 
he does, e. g., in III, 9-IV, 3 — if he did it might be 
argued that the preceding utterance against Judah 
would have a raison d'etre — but that throughout the 
passus his words are meant for the nation as a whole. 
This is clear from vv. 9-10, in which the prophet 
continues his charge against his own people by point- 
ing out that what makes their case worse even than 
that of the surrounding nations is the fact that they 
have experienced God's providence in a special degree, 
for not only did He conquer Kanaan for them, but 
He delivered them from the Egyptian bondage and 
subsequently led them in the wilderness for forty 
years. 2 Since, however, the whole nation shared in 

1 As stated above, I take VIII, 4~8a to have originally formed the 
continuation of III, 1-8. 

2 Amos' object in mentioning the deliverance from Egypt after the 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 233 

these acts of God's favor, it is obvious that through- 
out the passus II, 6-16 the prophet had the whole 
nation in mind, i.e., Judah as well as Israel. 

For the same reason IX, 7 must be taken as ad- 
dressed to the whole nation. In this verse Amos 
declares that the Israelites ("Bene-Yisra'el") are in 
no wise better to God than the Kusbites (the despised 
negro-race), that is to say, the Israelites do not enjoy 
any prerogative before any other nation; to be sure, 
God led Israel ("Yisra'el") out of Egypt, but even 
so did he lead the Philistines out of Kaphtor and the 
Aramaeans out of Kir. To argue that by "Bene- 
Yisra'el" and " Yisra'el" of this verse only Northern- 
Israel is understood x would be to maintain that for 
Amos Judah was not a part of the nation at all, that 
it was not led out of Egypt with the rest. 

On the ground of the above two passages it may 
safely be concluded that the whole nation is under- 
stood by the phrase, "my people Israel," in the 
following three passages: (a) "I shall apply the plumb- 
line 2 to my people Israel" of the vision, VII, yi., 
(b) "The end hath come for my people Israel" of the 
following vision, VIII, 1-2, and (c) "Go, prophesy 
against my people Israel," VII, 15. "The high-places 
of Isaac" and "the House of Isaac" of VII, 9 and 15, 
respectively, do not contradict, but rather corroborate 
this conclusion; for, since the name Isaac was asso- 
ciated particularly with the Judaean sanctuary, Beer- 
conquest of Kanaan, though in the actual order of events it preceded 
the latter, is made clear by his interpretation of that event in II, 2; cf. 
Book II, Part I, pp. 307^ 

1 This view is held by Seesemann, op. ciL, p. 13, and Meinhold, 
op.cit.,p. 53. 

2 "Apply the plumb-line," i. e., apply the rule or standard of divine 
righteousness. 



234 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Sheba, inasmuch as the stories of Isaac clustered 
about this shrine, it is evident that Judah must be 
included in these terms. No proof to the contrary 
follows from "I shall rise up against the house of 
Jeroboam with the sword," 9b, for that Amos thus 
specifies particularly the overthrow of Jeroboam, is to 
be explained in the same way as his fixing upon 
Beth-El as the place for delivering his message (see 
infra). 

From all these facts it follows that the answer com- 
monly given to the question, to whom Amos' prophe- 
cies are addressed, requires to be modified very 
radically. That Amos addresses his prophecies al- 
most wholly to Northern Israel, and only incidentally 
makes reference to Judah (as at first glance might 
seem to be the case) is not correct; he addresses him- 
self, as a rule, to Israel and Judah alike, and only 
now and then directs his utterances against his North- 
Israelitish hearers specifically. The passages where 
he does the latter are: III, 9-IV, 3; V, 6, 15; VI, 6, 13; 
and VII, 9b, referred to above. 1 But as in VI, 1-14 
he makes it clear by his express mention of Zion in v. 1 
and of Judah in v. 11 that, notwithstanding vv. 6 and 
13, his description of the riotous living and the per- 
version of justice on the part of the ruling classes and 
his prediction of the downfall of the nation because 
of these conditions apply to Judah as well as to Israel, 2 

1 What has been remarked above with regard to VII, 9b applies as 
well to all the other especial references to Northern Israel — they all 
find their explanation in Amos' reason for delivering his message in 
the Northern Kingdom. 

2 No proof to the contrary can be deduced from v. 14, since we are 
altogether in the dark as to the identity of the nahal ha ia rabha, 
"theWadioftheAraba." 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 235 

so in the case of V, 1-17 he makes this sufficiently plain 
by the mention of the Judaean sanctuary, Beer-Sheba, 
along with Beth-El and Gilgal of Northern Israel — the 
destruction of the former, it is important to note, 
he predicts in VIII, 13L no less positively than that 
of the latter here. And since V, 1-17 is addressed to 
Israel and Judah alike, it is evident that IV, 4-12 and 
V, 18-27 are likewise addressed to both, for together 
with V, 1-17 these pieces form a whole within the 
whole, Chaps. I-VI, the subject-matter of all three 
being the people's fundamentally wrong valuation of 
the ritual and cult. The fact that Amos in these 
parts fails to mention Zion is altogether irrelevant, and 
permits in no wise the inference which Meinhold x and 
others have drawn from it, that he thought more 
favorably of Jerusalem and its Temple than of the 
other sanctuaries. For, as we have seen, Amos right in 
the opening of his preaching assails the popular belief 
in the superiority of Zion no less vigorously than in 
IV, 4-V, 27 he attacks the belief in the sanctity of 
the other Yhwh sanctuaries. The irony of Amos' 
following up the popular phrase, "Yhwh shall storm 
from Zion and thunder from Jerusalem," with the 
declaration that the result of Yhwh's manifestation 
from Zion will be the destruction of His people is no 
less scathing than is that of the vision, IX, iff., with 
which Amos closes his preaching, and in which he 
describes how he sees God standing on the altar giv- 
ing the order to destroy the sanctuary and to bury 
beneath the ruins the multitude assembled for wor- 
ship. After the sweeping attack in I, 2, one can 
understand that Amos did not consider it necessary 

1 Op. cit., pp. 57ff. 



236 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

to mention Zion again in connection with the theme of 
IV, 4-V, 27. Similarly, in VIII, 131". he does not 
mention Gilgal again. 

It follows further from our discussion that by 
"Yisra'el," "Beth- Yisra'el," and "Bene-Yisra-el" in 
Amos the whole nation is understood — a meaning of 
the terms which agrees with their common usage in the 
Hexateuch and the historic literature even after the 
disruption of the Kingdom, when these terms came to 
be used frequently of the Northern Kingdom as dis- 
tinguished from Judah. The same holds true of the 
terms, "Ya akob" and "Beth-Ya'akob," in Amos: the 
whole nation is meant by them. As direct proof of this 
VI, 8 may be referred to, where the words, "I loathe 
that in which Jacob takes pride," etc., put in the 
mouth of God, are followed up in v. 11 (the original 
continuation of v. 8) by the declaration that "the 
great house and the small house," i.e., both kingdoms, 
shall be destroyed. Similarly Isaiah in Is. VIII, 17 
(and again in II, 6) uses " Beth- Ya' akob" to designate 
the whole nation, as is shown by " the two houses of Is- 
rael " of v. 14. For this reason it was but natural that, 
after the destruction of Samaria, all these terms came 
to be used to designate Judah, since Judah constituted 
the nation from that time on — cf. Is. I, 3, XXXI, 6; 
Mic. Ill, 1, 8f. (note v. 10); Jer. II, 4, 14, 26, 31. 

In the case of Ho sea the question of the usage of 
"Yisra'el," and "Beth-" or "Bene- Yisra'el" is more 
complicated; yet there can be no doubt that his 
preaching and predictions are addressed to Judah as 
well as to Israel. This is certain from such passages 
as, "Precious as grapes in the wilderness I found Israel, 
pleasing as the early ripe fig of the fig-tree in its prime 
I beheld your fathers, but no sooner did they come to 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 237 

Baal Peor than they gave themselves up to shameful 
practices and became abominable like the object of 
their love" (IX, 10), and "When Israel was young I 
loved him, and from Egypt I called him as my son; 
the more I called 1 them, the more they strayed away 
from me, they 1 sacrifice to the Baalim, they offer to 
images" (XI, if.); and apart from this, it follows 
inevitably from the very figure by which in the open- 
ing of his preaching, Chaps. I-III, Hosea depicts 
Yhwh's relation to Israel and Israel's apostasy and 
the course into which Yhwh is forced in consequence 
thereof, viz., the figure of the marital relationship: — 
for her infidelity, Yhwh, the husband of mother- 
Israel, is to give up His faithless spouse and drive her 
from his house, not to bring her back and betroth her 
to Himself anew, until, through the discipline of 
sorrow and suffering, he has effected her moral regen- 
eration. To hold that Hosea meant all this to apply to 
Northern Israel only would be to maintain that for 
him Northern Israel alone was Yhwh's spouse, that 
it alone enjoyed the privileges of His love, and that 
Judah was in no sense a part of the religious-social 
community of Israel. 

6. WHY AMOS DELIVERED HIS MESSAGE AT BETH-EL 

While, however, it was only natural for Hosea 
to choose the Northern Kingdom for the place of 
his public preaching, he being a citizen of that coun- 
try, in the case of Amos the matter is quite differ- 
ent. The question must be asked, why he proceeded 
to Beth-El to deliver his message, since, as we have 

1 Read, in accordance with the LXX, instead of qar e, u: k e qor% and 
instead of mipp e nehaem, with different word-division : mippanai hem. 



238 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

seen, it concerned his home-state no less than the 
sister-country. The explanation is to be sought 
not so much in the fact that Judah was at that time 
the vassal state of Northern Israel (cf. II Ki. XIV, 
9-14), or in the other fact that Amos must have 
reasoned that, Northern Israel being the natural 
bulwark of Judah, its conquest would lay bare the 
frontiers of Judah and thus engulf it inevitably in the 
downfall, as in the victories of Jeroboam II over 
Syria, and the sudden influx of prosperity which 
the country was enjoying in consequence. These 
successes, the prophecies of Amos show, were the 
immediate incentive to his preaching. 

Syria, which for a century or longer had been the 
powerful foe of Israel, had during the reign of Je- 
hoachaz reduced the country to the direst extremity 
(see II Ki. XIII, 7, also XII, 19). An idea of the 
people's anxiety over their situation may be obtained 
from the story, II Ki. XIII, 14-19, which relates how 
Joash implored the blessing of the dying Elisha for 
the success of their arms against Syria. In contrast 
to the view which Amos took later of Jeroboam's 
victories, it is interesting to note from this story how 
exercised Elisha was at his people's danger, and how 
his dying concern was that Yhwh's cause should 
prove victorious, that is, that Joash should triumph 
over Syria. For him the two things were identical, 
as they were for Amos' contemporaries. No wonder 
that the latter saw in Jeroboam's victories the un- 
mistakable sign of Yhwh's favor, and that their 
feeling of security and blind trust grew beyond mea- 
sure; never, they were convinced, had Yhwh been 
more visibly on the side of His people. This is the 
light in which these victories are presented in the 



AMOS' VIEW OF THE DOOM 239 

contemporary record, II Ki. XIV, 2 5-2 7, 1 and in 
"The Blessing of Moses," Deut. XXXIII, which 
probably dates also from the same time. The ruling 
classes of Samaria, in particular, were convinced that 
in Jeroboam's reconquest of Lo-dabar and Karnaim 
the kingdom had given evidence of its strength and 
virility (cf. Am. VI, 13 2 ) , so that without any fear or 
concern about the future they gave themselves up to 
the enjoyment of their successes and to a life of ease 
and luxury. It was as a protest against this blind ma- 
terialism of the people and against the false confidence 
with which Jeroboam's military successes had inflated 
them that Amos thundered forth his verdict of doom ; — 
his preaching may be said to have been the first enun- 
ciation of that governing principle emphasized by 
every one of the prophets, that not by military prowess 
and material prosperity, but by virtue of righteousness 
alone can nations as well as individuals endure. 

This explains why Amos went to the Northern 
Kingdom to deliver his message, and it accounts also 
for his repeated specific references to the House of 
Joseph and to its newly won prosperity. For him this 
flourishing kingdom, seemingly at the height of its 
power, even as in the days of the nation's pristine 
glory under David and Solomon, was in reality a 
sh e 'ertth Joseph, "a decimated Joseph," or, as he calls 
it again, a sh ae bh ae r Joseph, a "Joseph hastening to 
inevitable destruction." 

1 A critical examination shows that II Ki. XIV, 25-27 did not 
originate with the Deuteronomic Redactor, but was drawn from an 
older source. The detailed proof of this, however, does not belong 
here. 

2 "Ye, who exult in Lo-dabar, who boast, have we not by our 
strength reconquered Karnaim." 



CHAPTER V 

HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM— ESSENCE OF 
HOSEA'S PREACHING 

I. THE UNITY OF CHAPS. I-III 

Hosea no less certainly than Amos and Jeremiah 
looked upon the doom as the foregone result of the 
nation's guilt. His various appeals to do penance, 
II, 4f. excepted, 1 are not addressed to the heedless 
Israel of the present, which is running headlong to de- 
struction, but to the Israel of the future, which has sur- 
vived the downfall and, presumably, awakened to a 
realization of the sinfulness of its past life. This holds 
true of V, 15 b-VI, 3 and XIV, 2-9 no less than of II, 9 
and 1 6-2 5. 2 Contrary to the opinion of those critics 
who consider all these passages the work of later au- 
thors, it must be remarked that they are not only essen- 
tially Hoseanic in spirit, but they follow directly from 
the rest of his preaching, in the light of which they are 

1 Hos. X, 12 cannot be classed as a plea, but is a hypothetical state- 
ment, pointing out how the coming ruin might have been averted. 
Proof of this is the immediate continuation in v. 13: "As ye have 
plowed wickedness ye shall reap evil, shall eat the fruit of falsehood." 

2 No positive conclusion is possible in regard to XI, 7-1 1, for, owing 
to the hopeless text-condition of v. 7, we are altogether in the dark 
(1) in regard to the interpretation of v. 8a, (2) in regard to the ques- 
tion whether vv. 8b-i 1 formed at one time the immediate conclusion 
of 8a, or whether some intervening link dropped out either before or 
after 8a. It must, however, be remarked that these verses betray 
themselves both in language and thought as the genuine product of 
Hosea. 

240 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 241 

to be interpreted, and the key to which, in turn, is his 
conception of God as Infinite Love, expressed in 
Chap. III. (Of course, Volz, Marti, and Guthe deny 
that such was Hosea's conception of God, but their 
view can be upheld only by the arbitrary elimination 
of Chap. Ill as an unorganic part of Hosea. 1 There is 
no particle of ground for discarding Chap. Ill, but 
every reason to consider it genuine; see infra). 
Moreover, these passages are essential to the com- 
pleteness of Hosea's prophecies. Hosea's belief in a 
better world to come is really the corollary of his dec- 
laration that God is Love — the necessary outcome of 
his novel conception of the relation between the hu- 
man and the divine, to which he was led by the bitter 
experience in his own life. For Hosea the relation 
between God and Israel is in the nature of an indis- 
soluble ethical union, based not on any mere legal 
contract, which becomes invalid as soon as one party 
violates the covenant, but based, like the marriage 
bond, as he conceived it, on love and moral obligation. 
The union between God and Israel may be inter- 
rupted because of the latter's sinfulness, like the 
prophet's union with his erring wife; but even as Hosea 

1 See P. Volz, "Die Ehegeschichte Hosea's" (in "Zeitschrift fur 
Wissenschaftliche Theologie," XLI, 1898, pp. 321-335); Marti, 
" Das Dodekapropheton," pp. 6, 33L; Guthe, "Der Prophet Hosea," 
in Kautzsch 3 , II, pp. 51". This is not the place for a detailed discus- 
sion of such a radical procedure in general, nor of Volz' interpretation 
of Hosea's story of his marriage with Gomer, in particular. It may be 
well, however, to remark that, altogether apart from other considera- 
tions, the lofty ethics of the prophets and the spiritualization of 
religion as revealed in their lives and writings utterly exclude Volz' 
interpretation of Hos. I. — Harper, "Amos and Hosea," though he 
holds that "the fundamental idea of Hosea is his conception of 
Yahveh as a God of Love," considers the passages referring to Israel's 
future to be, on the whole, of exilic origin. 



242 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

trusted that by the power of his love his wife would 
eventually be lifted above sin, so he believed that by 
the power of the divine love evil would in the end be 
conquered in Israel and good set up in its place. 
By reason of this conception, however inevitable 
Hosea considers the destruction of the nation, he 
cannot but see in it a means to an end. The casting- 
off of Israel he looks upon as a purifying punishment 
by which God's love is to work the final salvation of 
the people, and lead them to a fuller union with Him- 
self. Accordingly, he concludes Chaps. I-III, which 
in the story of his life furnishes the key to all his 
preaching, by setting forth in II, 16-25 * h° w this 
regeneration is to be realized. God in His infinite love 
will follow the people, after the manner of love, 
into degradation and misery, and be with them in all 
the trials through which they will have to pass, until 
finally He has effected their change of heart and 
awakened their faith and love. In this way "the 
valley of tribulation will eventually be converted into 
a gate of hope" (II, 17), and a closer communion with 
God be established, a communion based not only "on 
righteousness and justice but on love and fervent 
devotion" (II, 21). 

If Marti finds the idea of love's conquering sin 
incompatible with the view that by severe, sustained 
punishment God will effect the conversion of the 
people, 2 he proceeds from the common error of looking 
upon Love and Law as antitheses. He forgets that 
true love is neither blind nor indulgent, but open-eyed 
and exacting. As the biblical writer expresses it, 

1 See Note at the end of the Chapter, "On the Original Order of 
Hos. I-III and The Original Place of II, 1-3." 

2 Op. tit., p. 6. 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 243 

"God punishes him whom He loveth, and affiicteth 
(read wfkhi'ebk LXX) him in whom He delighteth." x 
In contradistinction to Law, which is satisfied if the 
wrong has been avenged, and the wrongdoer punished, 
Love remains beside the offender, sharing with him the 
shame and misery, but not sparing him the suffering 
and remorse. It punishes in order to save, for it is 
only through suffering, through trials and self-denial, 
that the human spirit rises to freedom and enlighten- 
ment — a thought met with, fully developed, in 
Deutero-Isaiah. Thus Hosea did not take back his 
erring wife in order to lavish comfort on her, and still 
less to satisfy her sensual desires, but in the hope that 
through solitude and deprivation she might become 
chastened and purified, and once more worthy of his 
love. 

It may be mentioned in passing that the foregoing 
remarks make no pretension to completeness; Hosea's 
conception of God and the experience in his life which 
opened his mind to it are entered into only in so far 
as they serve to show how logically the various sub- 
parts of Chaps. I-III are developed out of one an- 
other, or, inversely, how logically they merge into one 
another to form a harmonious whole. In view of this 
latter fact it is clear that there is no justification for 
discarding Chaps. Ill, and II, 9 and 16-25, or anv 
part of them. Interpolations, particularly such 
lengthy and material ones as would be Chap. Ill and 
Chap. II, 16-25, never fit in harmoniously with the 
work of the original author, but invariably betray 
themselves through some more or less striking dis- 
crepancy. 

iProv. Ill, 12. 



244 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

2. THE EPILOGUE, XIV, 2-9 
SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE DESCRIPTION OF HIS FUTURE 
HOPE IN II, 16-25 

As in the opening part of his preaching, so in the 
conclusion of the same Hosea explicitly sets forth the 
purpose of the impending judgment — with this differ- 
ence, however, that, while in II, 16-25 he considers 
this purpose principally from the point of view of the 
workings of the divine Love, in XIV, 2-9 x he deals 
with it, primarily, from the point of view of the trans- 
formation through which the people must pass. 
The prophet's appeal in this epilogue to return to God 
with penitent heart is not addressed to contemporary 
Israel, as G. A. Smith 2 and Staerk 3 think, but to a 
future Israel, the Israel that will have survived the 
downfall. This is perfectly clear from "Thou hast 
incurred ruin by thy sins" (v. 2b), and also "They 
shall again abide under my shade" 4 (v. 8a), both of 
which sentences show that the prophet has reference 
to the time after the fall of the nation. There is 
no justification for the view, at present taken by most 
exegetes, that the epilogue is a product of later times. 
kasalta, "Thou hast incurred ruin," is prophetic per- 
fect like naphHa . . . bHhulath jisra'el, "Fallen is the 
virgin Israel," Am. V, 1, and hence does not permit the 
deduction that for the writer the downfall is actually 
a past event. Nor can 'al sus Id nirkabh, "We shall 

1 Verse 10 is a later addition, stating the moral which, it was thought, 
might be drawn from Hosea's writings. The fact that the passage 
served as prophetic pericope in the synagogue probably explains 
the comment. 

2 See op. cit., pp. 3ioff. 

3 See op. cit., pp. 38L 

4 Instead of b e sillo read b e silli. 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 245 

not ride on horses," (v. 4) be considered a proof of the 
influence of Is. XXX, 16 and XXXI, 1. In scoring the 
people for their blindness, from a religious as well as 
from a political point of view, in having sought 
protection from the world-powers, Hosea speaks of 
alliances formed with both Assyria and Egypt; cf. 

VII, 11, XII, 2, and note also IX, 3, 6, XI, 5, and 

VIII, 13c (the latter as read by the LXX). What 
more natural, therefore, than to find a reference to an 
alliance with Egypt as well as with Assyria in connec- 
tion with the prophet's hope that the future Israel 
will be cured of this fatal error of looking to the 
world-powers for assistance. In the light of this 
fact, the expression, "We shall no longer ride on 
horses," is quite as clear in Hosea as in Isaiah. As 
to its use in both, we must conclude either that 
the figure originated with Hosea and was borrowed 
from him by Isaiah, in support of which view it 
may be pointed out that there are in Is. XXX 
and XXXI other traces of the influence of Hosea 
on Isaiah; 1 or — and this seems the more probable 
theory — that even Hosea has no claim to the au- 
thorship of it, but that it belongs in the list of stock- 
phrases current in that age. The origin of the 
expression is to be seen in the fact that the main 

1 Cf Hos. X, 13b, ki bhatahta bh e rikhb e kha (LXX) ¥robh gibbo- 
rcekha, "For thou hast put thy trust in chariots, in the multitude of 
thy warriors," and Is. XXXI, ib, wajjibhfhu 'al raekhaebh ki rabh 
w e 'al parasim ki 'afmil m e 'od, "And they put their trust in chariots 
because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very 
numerous;" and also Hos. VIII, 4, himlikhu w e lo mimmennl heslru 
w e lo jadati, "They make kings without my consent, they set up 
rulers without my approval," and Is. XXX, 1 la a soth 'esa w e lo 
minni w e linsokh massekha w e lo ruhi, "To carry out a purpose without 
my consent and to conclude a treaty contrary to my spirit." 



246 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

trade in horses in ancient times was carried on by 
Egypt. 1 

Finally, the ideas of the epilogue are not at variance 
with those of the rest of the book, as they have been 
repeatedly argued to be. On the contrary, the con- 
fession of sin which Hosea puts in the mouth of the 
penitent Israel of the future (XIV, 4) is altogether 
consonant with what he considers the fundamental 
errors of Israel's religious and social-political life of the 
present. Throughout Hosea's prophecies runs the 
thought that, owing to the people's utter lack of 
knowledge of God, their worship of Yhwh is steeped in 
error, the grossest illustration of this error being their 
worship of Yhwh in images, or their idol-worship as 
he also calls it (cf. IV, 17, VIII, 4ff., X, sf., XI, 2, 
XIII, 2). Equally prominent is the other thought 
that the people's policy of seeking alliances with the 
world-powers, together with their confidence in their 
own military prowess, shows their lack of religious 
faith, even as it gives proof of their political blind- 
ness (cf. V, 13, VII, nff., VIII, 9, X, 3 f., 13, XII, 2). 
But through the fall of the nation Hosea expects that 
the people will at last be brought to realize and to 
abjure these errors of their past life: 

1 Contrary to the view expressed by Winkler on I Ki. X, 28 and 
II Chron. I, 16 (in "Alttestamentliche Untersuchungen," p. i73f.), 
and endorsed by Benzinger and Kittel (in Marti's HC and Nowack's 
HK respectively, ad loc, and also in SBOT, Critical Notes on II 
Chron. I, 16), it must now be considered an established fact that 
ancient Egypt carried on the trade in horses (see Steuernagel, "Deu- 
teronomium," on XVII, 16, Ed. Meyer in " Sitzungs-Berichte d. 
Berliner Akad.," 1908, p. 655, Amn. 1, Lehmann-Haupt, "Israel, 
Seine Entwicklung im Rahmen der Weltegeschichte," pp. 295, and 
also Kittel's change of view, accordingly, in Kautzsch 3 , ad 
loc). 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 247 

"Assyria shall not save us, 
we will no longer ride on horses, 
nor will we call any more the work of our hands our 
God." 

In addition to this negative declaration, the confession 
of sin contains the positive acknowledgement that 
their salvation lies solely in their absolute reliance on 
God: 

"For in Thee the fatherless findeth mercy." 

By this conclusion the confession touches incidentally 
on the central idea of Hosea's preaching, the idea that 
fatherly love is the foremost attribute of God. And as 
this opening part of the epilogue is in thought and 
language altogether akin to the rest of Hosea's proph- 
ecies, so does the following part, with the picture of 
God's forgiving love and His readiness to receive 
penitent Israel, show all the tenderness and depth of 
feeling which characterize Hosea's writings in general. 
The epilogue, therefore, clearly bears the stamp of 
Hosea's individuality, and, no doubt, received its 
present place from the prophet himself. In fact, we 
may be just as certain that it was really added by 
Hosea as we were sure that the Messianic outlook, 
Am. IX, 8b-i5, was not the work of Amos. 

3. chap, v, 15D-VI, 3 

ANOTHER EXPOSITION OP HIS FUTURE HOPE 

Equally certain is Hosea's authorship of V, 15b- VI, 
3. This passus, which, like XIV, 2-9, is an appeal to 
the future survivors of the downfall, forms a logical 
conclusion to V, i-i5a, with which it constitutes a 



248 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

harmonious whole. The uniformity in language and 
style between it and the concluding verses of the 
preceding prediction of judgment produces an effect 
of unity which would be impossible if it were not an 
organic part of these verses. For no interpolate^ 
however laboriously he imitates his original, ever 
succeeds in producing the effect of perfect harmony, 
this being the result alone of that close though subtle 
interdependence between form and contents which is 
essential in every literary product of worth. Above 
all, however, it is by the thought expressed in v. 3a 
that these verses bear the unmistakable stamp of 
Hosea's spiritual property: w e ned el a nird e pha ladaath 
'aethjahwce — k e sah a renu khen nirnsa'eii, as Giesebrecht 
with fine discernment has emended the second part 
of the half-verse. 1 (This is one of those rare emenda- 
tions which, when once discovered, are self-evident.) 
The customary rendering of 3aa fails to bring out the 
significant meaning of these words: nird e pha ladaath 
is not coordinate with ned eC a, but is a circumstantial 
clause. Accordingly, the sentence is to be translated : 

"Ye shall know God by aspiring to know Him; 2 " 
The second part of the half-verse is a modified expres- 
sion of the same thought: 

1 See " Beitrage zur Jesaiakritik," p. 208. I would add by way of 
explanation that the reading of the Masoretic text is due, primarily, 
to false word-division in the copying of a MS. which as yet had no 
word-division, and in which, besides, vowel-letters were but sparsely 
used even at the end of a word, and, finally, in which the silent H of 
the suffix ^H was omitted. Whether the 3 ending J3 and beginning 
*K¥EJ was, in the original MS., written only once, or whether its 
omission in the second case is altogether due to a correction intro- 
duced by the later copyist cannot be decided. 

2 Jahwa is to be construed as object with both nird e pha ladaath 
and n e d e 'a. 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 249 

"If we but search for Him we shall surely find Him." 

The spiritual truth revealed here is the same that is 
expressed in the Sermon on the Mount: "Ask, and it 
shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and 
it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that 
asketh receive th, and he that seeketh findeth; and to 
him that knocketh it shall be opened " (Matt. VII, 
7, 8). And what Aug. Sabatier remarks in regard to 
the latter, applies with equal fitness to Hos. VI, 3: 
"The search for God cannot be fruitless; for the 
moment I set out to seek Him, He finds me and lays 
hold of me." "The gift of God," as he expresses it in 
another place, " comes only to the felt need and the 
active desire of man." * Nothing could be more 
characteristic of Hosea, nothing more consonant with 
his views in general than the revelation of this fun- 
damental truth. For Hosea knowledge of God is the 
sum of what man should aspire to, and lack of knowl- 
edge of God the cause of all evil; — that vice and cor- 
ruption hold sway, and that "the spirit of whoredom 
possesseth the people" is for him but the result of 
their not knowing God : 

"There is no truth, no love, no knowledge of God in 

the land : 
Perjury, deceit, murder, theft, and adultery — 
dissolute they are, and one bloody deed 
follows on the heels of the other." (IV, if.; and see 

also V, 4). 

And here it is important to note that for Hosea, as 
for the other prophets, knowledge of God is not an 
intellectual acquisition, not a theological system or 
creed, but means the knowledge or experience of 

1 " Outlines of a Philosophy of Religion," p. 33 and p. 334. 



250 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

God in one's heart. The end and object of God's dis- 
ciplinary work with His faithless people, he sets forth 
in II, 21-22, is to effect this experience: 

"And I will betroth thee unto me forever; 

I will betroth thee unto me by the bond 

of righteousness and justice, 

by the bond of love and fervent devotion : 

And I will betroth thee unto me in faithfulness, and 

thou shalt know God." 

V, 1 5b- VI, 3, therefore, may well be considered as 
forming, much in the same way as the epilogue, an 
important supplement to the prophet's outlook of 
hope and promise, II, 16-25, i n that it develops an 
essential thought which in the latter, by reason of the 
aspect from which the future restoration was con- 
sidered (see supra), was brought out only partially — 
the thought, that the people's experiencing God in 
their hearts is the condition of the future consumma- 
tion, in fact is the consummation. 

VI, 3, as indicated above, concludes the sermon. 
Verse 4, like the remaining verses of Chap. VI, is a 
fragment of another sermon. It cannot be considered 
the continuation of v. 3, as most of the exegetes take 
it, for since vv. 1-3 speak of sincere repentance, of 
true conversion, it is obvious that they cannot possibly 
have been followed up by an answer on God's part 
questioning the sincerity of the people. 1 Apart from 
this, the really vital thought in this preeminently 

1 That vv. 1-3 are "an earnest expression of faith and zeal" is 
acknowledged by Volz, op. tit., p. 33, and by K. J. Grimm, "Euphe- 
mistic Liturgical Appendices in the Old Testament," p. 70, but this 
fact is wrongly considered by them an argument against Hosea's 
authorship. 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 251 

spiritual prayer seems to have escaped the exegetes, 
that is the people's absolute assurance, that their 
yearning for God will of necessity be satisfied. In 
contrast to the prayer of the epilogue, therefore, this 
prayer does not call for a reassuring answer from God. 

4. NOTE ON THE ORIGINAL ORDER OF HOS. I-III AND 
THE ORIGINAL PLACE OF II, 1-3 

Chapter III, as many scholars rightly hold, must 
originally have followed Chap. I. Not only is it 
unlikely that the prophet, in telling the story of his 
life, would have separated the two parts from one 
another by the discourse, II, 4-25, but this discourse 
presupposes Chap. Ill as well as Chap. I. It is the 
detailed application of the story of his own life, as 
given in Chaps. I and III, to God's experience with 
Israel. Apart from this, I find direct proof of this 
original chapter-arrangement in the description of 
Israel's future restoration, II, 1-3. The difficulty 
which this description has presented to the exegetes is 
very simply solved by taking it as the original con- 
clusion of III, or more correctly, as the original 
continuation of III, 4-5 (exclusive of izf'eth david 
malkam and b'aJfrilh hajjamim). The description, as 
a whole, bears a close relation to Hosea's mode of 
thought in I and III; further, "and they shall appoint 
one head " of II, 2 refers directly to the situation 
described in III, 4, "many days the Israelites shall 
abide without a king and without a chief," being in 
fact logically conditioned by it. On the other hand, 
ixfniqb'su of II, 2 is no proof whatever of the exilic 
origin of II, 1-3, since the phrase does not mean a be 
gathered," as many scholars take it, but means here, 
as frequently elsewhere, "assemble" or "rally" 



252 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

(cf. e. g. II Chron. XX, 4, XXXII, 4, Is. XLV, 20, 
XL VIII, 14). Neither can such a date be argued on 
the ground of the author's hope for a united Judah and 
Israel, for the express mention of such a hope on the 
part of Hosea is sufficiently explained by the open 
outbreak of hostility between Judah and Israel, which, 
as we know from Is. IX, 20, occurred at the time of his 
preaching. Finally, w e( alil min ha'araes of v. 2, as 
Lambert (in Revue des Etudes Juives, XXXIX, 
p. 300) suggests, means just as Ex. I, 10, "they shall 
gain mastery of" or "dominion over the country. " 
(In further proof of Lambert's view, I shall add that 
to this meaning of l ala min, equivalent to that of 
'ala c al, Deut. XXVIII, 43, the similar meaning of 
l amad min in Dan. XI, 8 may be compared.) When 
III, 1-5 became shifted from its original place after 
Chap. I and placed after Chap. II, the original con- 
tinuation of III, 1-5, that is II, 1-3, being left be- 
hind, became subsequently joined to II, 4-25, as if 
it formed the beginning of the same. 

The translation of III, 4-5, II, 1-3 in their proper 
succession follows: 

III, 4 "For the Israelites shall abide many days 
without a king and without a chief, 
without sacrifice and without massebah, with- 
out ephod and teraphim. 
5 Afterwards the Israelites shall return and seek 
the Lord their God; 
they shall yearn for the Lord and His good- 
ness. 
II, 1 And the number of the Israelites shall become 
as the sands of the sea which cannot be meas- 
ured nor counted, 



HOSEA'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 253 

and in place of their being called, 'Ye are not 

my people,' 
they shall be called 'Children of the living 

God.' 

2 And the Judaeans and the Israelites shall 

assemble 
and appoint one head, and they shall gain 

dominion over the country, 
for great shall be the day of Jezreel. 

3 One shall call your brethren A mmi (My People) 
and your sisters Ruhama (Beloved)." 

(Instead of 'intra read 'anfru, prophetic perfect; the 
3rd plural is impersonal construction. The vocaliza- 
tion Hmru was caused no doubt by the imperative 
rtbhu of the following verse.) 

"Great shall be the day of Jezreel" (v. 2): In I, 3 
the prophet referred to the utter defeat of the present 
Israel on the plain of Jezreel; here he refers to the 
triumph of the future Israel on the same battle-field — 
great shall be the day, he says in effect, when, on the 
famous battle-field of Jezreel, Israel shall again gain 
dominion over the country. 



CHAPTER VI 

ISAIAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM AND HIS AT- 
TITUDE TOWARD THE POLITICAL AFFAIRS 
OF THE DAY 

I. OPINIONS OF PRESENT-DAY SCHOLARS 

Our examination of the prophetic writings up to this 
point has borne out the assertion made in Chapter II 
that the prophets looked upon the doom as inevitable, 
and that they neither expected nor designed that their 
words should influence the immediate course of events. 
As to Isaiah there is much difference of opinion. The 
majority of biblical scholars, however, hold that 
Isaiah, unlike his predecessors, Amos and Hosea, did 
not keep himself aloof from political life, but that, like 
the prophets of old, he assumed the role of a practical 
statesman, and approached the rulers of the state with 
precise directions as to the course they should pursue 
in certain critical situations. They grant that he was 
at first scorned and rejected, but think that he grad- 
ually gained a powerful influence over the government 
and people, until at last he practically guided the helm 
of state and shaped the subsequent development of 
affairs. Those who hold this view maintain further 
that in the supreme crisis of the invasion of Judah by 
Sennacherib's armies in the year 701, which event, they 
think, marks the height of his influence, Isaiah changed 
his mind regarding the judgment awaiting his people; 
and that, instead of predicting, in consistency with 

254 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 255 

his life-long conviction, that the hour for the execution 
of judgment had at last arrived, he declared that 
Yhwh Himself would rise in defence of Zion and 
Jerusalem and bring about the defeat of the world- 
power, Assyria, on His own holy mountain. 1 

These two points obviously have such a decisive 
bearing on our question, how the prophets viewed the 
doom, that a discussion of them must necessarily be 
interwoven with the discussion of this question. 

2. isaiah's earliest prophecies 

(a) the consecration vision 

From his consecration vision, Chap. VI, it is clear 
that at the very outset of his ministry Isaiah cherished 
no illusions whatever about the situation. He fully 
realized the insuperable distance in religious views 
which separated his countrymen from him, and which 
made their case so hopeless. He knew that they could 
not comprehend his words, he knew that they were 

1 See W. Robertson Smith, "The Prophets of Israel," pp. 205-210, 
254ff., 296, 320, 33off., 35off.; Wellhausen, " Israelitische und Jiidische 
Geschichte" (1901), pp. 1243.; Smend, " Alttestamentliche Relig- 
ionsgeschichte," 2 pp. 231-240, 2551!.; Giesebrecht, "Die Berufsbe- 
gabung der Alttestamentlichen Propheten," pp. 84f.; Budde, "Reli- 
gion of Israel to the Exile," i47f., i53ff.; Driver, "Isaiah: His Life 
and Times," pp. 3, 32, 62, 69-83; H. P. Smith, "Old Testament His- 
tory," pp. 238, 244, 255; Ch. F. Kent, " A History of the Hebrew- 
People," pp. 128, 130, 142, I44ff.,i48ff.; F. Wilke, "Jesaiaund Assur" 
(1905), pp. if., 57ff.; Staerk, op. ciL, pp. 64, 68, 85s.; Kittel, "Ge- 
schichte des Volkes Israel " (1909), II, pp. 477, 486, 4941!., 501, 5051!.; 
Hans Schmidt in "Die Schriften des Alten Testaments herausgeg. 
von Gressmann, etc.," II, 2, pp. I2ff. On the point of Isaiah's sup- 
posed change of view regarding the doom cf. also Kautzsch, " Bib- 
lische Theologie des Alten Testaments," pp. 258L, and Meinhold, 



256 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

doomed. How ineffectual he felt his preaching to be 
for his own age may be seen from his bitter declaration 
in vv. oi. that the purpose of his mission was "to dull 
their hearts, to deafen their ears, and to blind their 
eyes," — that is to say, to demonstrate their utter 
corruption and spiritual blindness, and so to make 
clear their ripeness for judgment. 

There is no occasion to suppose that this vision was 
written in the light of his later experience. The central 
fact of the vision is the revelation to the prophet of 
God's inexorable decree of judgment. Were we to 
question the trustworthiness of the prophet's descrip- 
tion of what passed in his mind in that hour, we could 
no longer attach value to the vision, in any respect, as 
a record of his spiritual experience. It is illogical to 
look upon the account as a valuable record of the 
turning-point in his life and to maintain, at the same 
time, that it is colored by his later experiences — more 
specifically, that the tone in which the prophet speaks 
of the purpose of his mission is owing to the lack of 
response which his message in due course received, 
instead of to the hopelessness with which he started 
out on his ministry. As a matter of fact, the same tone 
prevails in II, 6-22, which all agree dates from the 
very year of his call to prophecy, and also in IX, 7- 

op. tit., pp. i35ff.; the latter thinks that this change of view dates 
at least as far back as 711 (pp. 14.fi:.) 

Fr. Kuchler, "Die Stellung des Propheten Jesaia zur Politik seiner 
Zeit," joins issue with this view of Isaiah's political influence, though 
he holds with the above-mentioned scholars that during the Assyrian 
invasion Isaiah did change his mind regarding the doom threatening 
the country (cf. pp. VI, 27!, 43, 47, 52L 56). Kuchler, as he states in 
the preface, pp. Vf., wrote this treatise in order to show by one 
example how utterly untenable Winkler's theory of Old Testament 
Prophecy is. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 257 

X, 4+V, 26-30, which, most exegetes agree, belongs to 
the earliest period of his activity. 

And not only does Isaiah make himself clear regard- 
ing the inevitableness of the judgment, he is equally 
emphatic on the point that the destruction is to be not 
a partial but a complete one. To his question, "How 
long? " that is, how long it shall be the purpose of his 
mission to demonstrate, so to speak, the total apathy 
of "this people" (the people of his own age), God's 
answer is: 

"Until the cities be desolate, without inhabitants, 

and the houses be destitute of men, 

and the land be converted into a desolation, 

and God have removed mankind, 

and the desolation be great in the land; 

and should there be a tenth still left, 

this in turn shall fall a prey to destruction, 

like the terebinth and the oak of which when felled 

only the stump remains." * 

The comparison is to the same effect as that in XVII, 
5f. (of the prophecy of the immediately following 

1 Zaera qodaes mas§abhta, as the majority of scholars hold, is a 
later addition; how late may be seen from the fact that the LXX did 
not read it. 

Hackmann's theory (in "Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia," pp. 
72ff.) that in the vision, Chap. VI, and in the prophecies of the first 
period of his activity Isaiah is concerned with Northern Israel only, 
and that it is the latter that is understood by "this people " of v. 9, 
has no basis. Hackmann overlooked the fact that by "and I dwell 
among a people of unclean lips" (v. 5) Isaiah made it perfectly 
clear that his native country, Judah, was certainly included in the 
verdict passed on the people in his consecration-vision (cf. G. Bu- 
chanan Gray, "The Book of Isaiah," I, p. no) 



258 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

period), where of the destruction of Israel the prophet 

says : 

"It shall be as when the harvestman grasps the 

standing grain, 
and his (other) arm reaps the ears — 
Yea, it shall be as when the ears are gleaned in the Vale 

Rephaim; 
or gleanings shall be left as at the beating of an olive 

tree — 1 
two or three berries in the top branch, 
four or five in the (other) branches of the fruit-tree." 2 

An analogous comparison in Amos is : 

"As the shepherd rescues from the mouth of the Hon 
a couple of shin-bones or the tip of an ear, 
precisely so shall the Israelites escape 
who sit in Samaria in the corner of the couch ..." 
(Am. Ill, 12). 

In all these comparisons, the idea expressed is that 
the nation shall be reduced to nothingness; those 
surviving the destruction will no more constitute a 
body politic than the stump of a tree forms a tree. 

(b) his future hope — x, 21-23 

Thus understood, VI, 13 in no wise conflicts with 
Isaiah's future hope, to which he gave expression soon 

1 In order to fully understand the second comparison one must 
bear in mind that the olives are picked by hand, and what is left after 
the picking, being beyond reach of the hand, is knocked off with a 
pole. What remains after the latter process will be a few scattered 
berries that were overlooked or missed by the pole, just as after the 
gleanings have been gathered, only a few stray ears may still be 
found in the field. 

2 Read, with different word-division, bisiphe happorijja. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 259 

after his summons to prophecy in the name he be- 
stowed on his son, She'ar Yashub, "A Remnant shall 
Return;" for this name, as Marti points out, implies a 
confirmation rather than a denial of the judgment. It 
signifies, however, that the remnant, i. e., the survi- 
vors of the judgment, shall become converted. 1 

That this is really the significance of She 'ar Yashub 
there can be no doubt, for the utterance in which at 
the time Isaiah explained the meaning of his son's 
name has not been entirely lost, as is generally 
thought, but has been preserved in its essential part 
in X, 21-23. In proof of this it is not necessary to 
enter into a critical analysis of the whole of X, 5-34, 
which, biblical scholars are agreed, is made up of 
heterogeneous elements. 2 It will suffice for our 
purpose to point out that vv. 21-23 are clearly not the 
original continuation of v. 20, since the author of the 
latter looks upon the destruction as an actual occur- 
rence (Israel or the House of Jacob are actually for 
him a s e 'ar and p e letath, "a remnant" and " those who 
have escaped" from the catastrophe), while for the 
author of vv. 21-23 the destruction is yet to come; 
and that, just as clearly, they cannot have formed 
originally a part of vv. 24-27; for they have an 
ominous tone, emphasizing that the destruction is 
inexorably decreed, while vv. 24-27 are of an alto- 
gether reassuring nature, bidding the people dispel 
all fear since their deliverance from their vanquisher 
is at hand. 

Internal evidence that X, 2 1-23 is a fragment of an 
utterance designed to explain the name of the proph- 
et's son, She'ar Yashub, is not lacking: (1) It has in 

1 See "Das Buch Jesaia," on Chap. VI, 3. 

2 See infra, pp. 2735. and 285s. 



260 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

common with Isaiah's older prophecies, i. e., those 
of the first period and those of the time of the Syro- 
Ephraimitic campaign, the expression, "Ya'akob," 
used to designate the whole nation (see supra, p. 236). 
(2) Like the consecration vision it emphasizes that 
"the destruction inexorably decreed" 1 will be com- 
plete, will engulf "the whole country" (v. 23; cf. to the 
b e qaeraebh kol hd'araes of the latter the beqaeraebh 
ha'araes of VI, 13). (3) By killajon harus soteph 
fdaqa of v. 22, "destruction is unalterably decreed 
sweeping in righteousness like a flood," it pointedly 
reiterates what Isaiah developed at length in his 
description of the Day of Yhwh, II, 6-22, V, 15-16, 2 
which belongs unquestionably to the oldest of his 
prophecies, viz., that by the certain destruction of 
nation and country alone might the way be prepared 
for the recognition of God's moral kingdom among 
men. Since X, 21-23, therefore, dates from the 
period in which his son, She 'ar Yashub, was born, and 

1 kala w e naeh <z rasa of v. 23 is a hendiadys. 

2 V, 15L, no doubt, got misplaced in Chap. V from II, 6-22, where 
originally, in all probability, it formed the closing refrain of the now 
completely mutilated third strophe of the latter. XVII, 7-8 may be 
another misplaced part of this strophe, but the evidence is not so 
convincing as in the case of V, i5f. In the latter case there can be no 
doubt that the verses were first omitted from their proper place, then 
added in the margin and later, when the MS. was being recopied, 
inserted in the wrong place in the body of the text (see supra, p. 116, 
n. 2). Proof of this is the identity of V, 15a with II, 9a, which is to be 
explained in the following way: II, 9a is to be considered as the open- 
ing words of the original closing refrain of the third strophe (II, 6-22, 
it is generally granted, have come down to us in complete disorder) 
and V, 15a as the repetition of these same words in the margin for the 
purpose of indicating the place where the omission belongs. — For the 
rearrangement of the first two strophes of II, 6-22 cf. Marti, op. cit. 
pp. 34f. ? and Gray, op. cit., pp. 49L 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 261 

since its contents are so directly applicable to the 
missing utterance regarding the name She'ar Yashub, 
it is safe to conclude that it is really a fragment of that 
utterance: 

"A remnant shall return, 
a remnant of Jacob unto the mighty God. 
Even though thy people be as the sands of the sea, 
a mere remnant of them shall return; 
destruction is unalterably decreed, 
sweeping in righteousness like a flood. 
For an unalterable decree of destruction 
the Lord, God Sabaoth, shall execute on the whole 
land." 

(c) ex, 7-X, 4+v, 25b- 3 o 

Chapter IX, 7-X, 4 and its original conclusion, 
V, 25D-30, 1 may serve as another illustration of the 
hopelessness with which Isaiah from the very start 
viewed the situation. This sermon, which also uses 
"Ya'akob" to denote the whole nation, is addressed to 
Israel and Judah alike, though, like Hosea's prophecies 

1 V, 250-30 is another instance of a lengthy omission which was 
first added in a blank space of the MS. and later inserted from there 
in the wrong place. The case affords a good insight into the un- 
critical, altogether mechanical procedure of the ancient copyists. 
The copyist who was responsible for the omission took, for his part, 
unusual pains to indicate where the omitted passage belonged; he 
repeated not merely one or two of the immediately preceding words, 
but the whole refrain, "In spite of all this His anger hath not been ap- 
peased, and His hand is still outstretched," with which the preceding 
strophe, X, 1-4, closed; yet all his precautions were wasted on the 
later copyist, who doubtless gave no thought whatever to the matter, 
but inserted the passage at the point where he found it. The identi- 
fication by modern scholars of V, 26-30 as the original conclusion of 
IX, 7-X, 4 was due primarily to the repetition of the refrain. 



262 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

and to a certain extent also Amos ', it deals specifically 
with the conditions in the Northern Kingdom, no 
doubt because it was prompted by the civil war raging 
there. By the emphatic ha 1 am kullo, "the entire peo- 
ple," of v. 8, the prophet, right in the opening of the 
speech, makes it clear that the whole nation, his own 
countrymen as well as the citizens of Ephraim and Sa- 
maria, will suffer the effects of God's "word" (i. e., His 
decree of judgment). Further, the prophet devotes a 
whole strophe (X, 1-4) to the conditions in his home- 
state. It would be altogether arbitrary to throw out 
this strophe, as some have done, as not originally be- 
longing to this sermon ; it is not at all incongruous with 
the preceding strophes, nor with the general drift of 
the sermon; for in IX, 7-20 the prophet does not limit 
himself to the retrospect of the reverses which the 
people of Northern Israel have been suffering, but 
side by side with this retrospect describes the corrup- 
tion which pervades all classes of society there — cor- 
ruption of which the present state of anarchy is but 
the culmination. 

Indeed, X, 1-4, with its description of the wholesale 
perversion of justice prevailing in Judah, forms a 
fitting supplement to the picture presented in IX, 7-20 
of the degeneracy of the sister-kingdom. Moreover, it 
is very probable that the retrospect of IX, 7-20 even 
contained a reference to reverses suffered by Judah. 
The sare i*sin in v. 10, as is widely acknowledged, is 
certainly not original text; the phrase is not only in 
itself strange, but in its present connection admits of 
no satisfactory interpretation. Apart from this, there 
is nowhere in the records any mention of an attack of 
Aram on, or even of a hostile attitude of Aram toward, 
Northern Israel at that time; but II Chron. XXVIII, 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 263 

17 records an attack of Edom on Judah, and, what is 
particularly important, records it as occurring simul- 
taneously with an attack of the Philistines on Judah 
(ib., v. 18). This circumstance, to my mind, makes it 
fairly conclusive that, instead of J aram miqqaedaem, 
v. n of Isaiah's retrospect originally read ,<B dom 
miqqaedaem, and that thus by the words, "Edom on 
the East and the Philis tines on the West," Isaiah had 
reference to this simultaneous attack of Edom and the 
Philistines on Judah. (Note that in II Ki. XVI, 6, 
where the attack of Edom on Judah is likewise re- 
corded, the original ,{B dom in the first part of the verse 
was both times similarly misread, while in the second 
part not only the LXX and Targ., but also the Kere 
of the Masorites, has correctly 1a domlm for the Kethib 
,a romlm}) With such a deduction it accords that 
in the preceding v. 10 the LXX read j s ¥ nn nv tovs 
eiravicna\x4vQvs iirl opos *2eiobv — "the adversaries of 
Mt. Zion" — for the questionable pn "n*. 2 

As of the description of the Day of Yhwh, it 
may be said of IX, 7-X, 4, V, 26-30 that Isaiah 
expatiates therein on the revelation he received in the 
consecration-vision. Only, in the former he develops 
more fully the idea of God's holiness, which must 
destroy everything impure opposing it, while in the 
latter he dwells at length on the total apathy of the 

1 r e sin, as Klostermann, " Die Bucher Samuelis und der Konige," 
ad loc, points out, was not inserted in the verse until after the mistake 
'aram had crept into the text. 

2 The mistaken reading of the Masoretic text is due to false-word- 
division in the copying of an archetype which had as yet no word- 
division; the copyist joined the "1 of IH to p¥ reading p¥"l and mis- 
took the n for a vowel-letter of the defectively written "l¥ (H occurs 
occasionally in Aramaic as vowel-letter of the plur. masc. construct 
state). 



264 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

people, to demonstrate which, he declared in the 
consecration- vision, seemed to him the immediate 
purpose of his mission. All the dire calamities that 
God has been visiting on the nation, the prophet points 
out, have been to no effect. Neither the crushing 
defeat which they have suffered from the hands of 
their enemies, nor the civil war which has wrought 
havoc in the country, has availed to make the people 
recognize God's punishing hand and effect "their 
return to Him that hath been smiting them." Blind 
to the fact that their lawlessness has brought them to 
the verge of ruin, the people "speak in their pride and 
haughtiness of heart : 

Bricks have fallen down, but with quarry stones shall 

we rebuild; 
Sycamores have been felled, but with cedars shall we 

replace them." 

Thus Wickedness prevails unabated, spreading to and 
infecting all classes of society: 

"For Wickedness burneth like fire: 

Consuming thorns and briars, 

It (spreads) kindling the thickets of the forest, 

upwards they whirl in columns of smoke." 

Because of these conditions the day of visitation is 
at hand, their destruction is certain — destruction 
from which there will be no escape, which will sweep 
away them and their earthly glory alike. 1 The nation 
which God has called upon to execute the judgment is 
a mighty and an irresistible one, and it will sweep down 

1 Isaiah here (X, 3) touches briefly on what he developed in full in 
his description of the Day of Yhwh, II, 6-22 etc., that at God's 
appearance for judgment all earthly glory must sink in the dust. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 265 

upon the country as the lion assails his prey. Though 
Isaiah does not mention the nation by name, there 
can be no doubt that he means Assyria. The ex- 
pression "from the end of the earth" (v. 26) is to be 
accounted for, like the similar expressions in Jeremiah 
and Deutero-Isaiah referred to on p. 49, n. 1, by 
the fact that for the prophets the territory of Assyria 
formed the geographical horizon to the east. 

3. THE PROPHECIES OF THE FOLLOWING PERIODS 

Isaiah's prophecies of the following periods show in 
no wise any change or modification in his view of the 
situation from that revealed in his earliest prophecies. 
Whether we turn to VII, 3-14, 1 16-2 1, 1 23-25, and to 
VIII, 1-8, 2 11-18 of the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic 
campaign, or to XXVIII, 1-4, 7-23, dating either 
from the time of the siege of Samaria or from the 
immediately preceding time, 3 or to XXIX, 1-4, 5C-6, 

1 Verses 15 and 22 were added later, after v. 14 had come to be 
understood as a Messianic prediction — a prediction which, as the 
context shows, was far from Isaiah's thoughts. He had reference 
in v. 14 not to the remote, but to the immediate future, that is to 
say, to the turn which, he believed, events would take in less than 
a year's time. The full discussion of this much-debated point, how- 
ever, can be taken up only hand in hand with the interpretation of 
VII, 3-25, as a whole, in Volume II. This prophecy (like the follow- 
ing VIII, iff.) differs in its literary character from other prophecies in 
that, owing to the peculiar circumstances of the case of which the 
prophet wished to convey a true picture, it has the form of a memoir. 

2 Verses 9-10, which break the sequence of thought are a later 
addition, due, like the additions in the preceding chapter, to the 
tendency of later times to put a Messianic construction on the pro- 
phecy, The words, "Immanu El," at the close of verse 8, are part of 
the addition; they form its beginning. 

3 XXVIII, 1-4, 7-22, as we shall show in Volume II, must have 
formed from the start an organic whole, the second part of which 



266 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

9-14, and XXX, 1-17, and XXXI, 1-4 of Isaiah's 
last period of activity — the time of Judah's alliance 
with Egypt, 704-702 — we find that the prophet speaks 
with the same positiveness of the irremediable blind- 
ness and corruption of the people and of their certain 
doom. 

Besides this, the strongest possible evidence that 
this fundamental conviction of his underwent no 
change, either in the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic 
campaign or in the initial years of Judah's alliance with 
Egypt (704-702), is furnished by the prophet's state- 
ments relative to the preservation of his prophecies of 
these respective periods. In regard to the latter 
period he is just as outspoken as to his reason for 
preserving his prophecies as we found he was in regard 
to the former (see supra, p. 169). He declares that 
since his words have been ineffectual for his own 
age, they must be saved for a future and — the implica- 
tion is — a more discerning generation, in order to 
prove to them the truth of God's word: 



"Now go, write it 1 down, 2 inscribe it 1 in a scroll, 
that it * may serve as a lasting testimony (r. la'ed) in 

the days to come; 
for it is a rebellious people, faithless sons they are, 
sons who will not hear the revelation of God, 
who say to the seers, 'See not,' and to the prophets, 

shows no less clearly than the first that it was delivered prior to the 
downfall of Samaria. 

1 Instead of the sing, suffix and the 3rd sing, of the verb, the LXX, 
it is important to note, read the plural suffix and the 3rd plural 
respectively: "write them down, inscribe them in a scroll, that they 
may serve," etc. 

2 'al lu a h 'ittam is a gloss, as l al sephaer shows. It is probably to 
be ascribed to the influence of VIII, if. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 267 

'Do not prophesy to us the truth! 

Speak to us flatteries, prophesy delusions! 

Get out of our way, begone from our path! 

Leave us in peace about the Holy One of Israel!'" 

(XXX, 8-1 1). 

More expressive even are Isaiah's words in the 
subsequent prophecy of this period, where, in a strain 
similar to that employed in the consecration-vision 
almost forty years earlier, he declares that God has 
stricken the people with blindness and apathy: he 
continues significantly for our purpose: 

"Therefore, the prophecy of all this is 

for you like the words of a sealed book, 

which if one hands to a learned man, 

saying, pray, read this, he replies, 

I cannot, for it is sealed; 

and which if one hands to one 

who is not learned, saying, pray, read this, 

he replies, I am not learned " (XXIX, 11-12). 

Is it likely that Isaiah would have viewed his life- 
work in such a light if, during the twenty years of his 
activity previous to this, he had been steadily gaining 
in influence, if he had reached the point where his 
counsel was eagerly sought by King and people, and 
his words carried the weight of conviction to his 
hearers? It is very clear the prophet's thoughts were 
not bent on effecting the conversion of his contem- 
poraries, and still less were they set on influencing 
the direction of the affairs of state. Isaiah simply 
preached the word of God, as it was revealed to him, 
to a people who would not listen — to a deaf and faith- 
less people. 



268 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 



4. THE THEORIES ADVANCED IN EXPLANATION OF 
ISAIAH'S ALLEGED CHANGE OF VIEW UNTENABLE 



As to Isaiah's alleged change of view regarding the 
doom in the following year, that is at the time of the 
Assyrian invasion in 701, it will be seen, after the 
deductions of the previous paragraphs, that such a 
change is, on the face of the matter, unlikely. It 
would be at variance with those basic views from 
which his whole preaching proceeds, and it cannot 
be reconciled with the well-poised, positive personality 
which the prophet presents throughout his career. 
If Isaiah suddenly changed his lifelong view on the 
most vital point of his preaching, we may be sure that 
it was an event of the greatest moment to himself; that 
it was not the result of mere whim or momentary 
vacillation, but of positive reasoning, the psychology 
of which could certainly be traced. Kittel's apology, 
"We have no assurance that doubts and all sorts of 
contradictory elements were not mingled together in 
his consciousness," 1 does not touch the point at 
all, and the explanation of Wilke and Staerk, that 
Isaiah's supposed change of view regarding the doom 
was the result of his altered estimation of Assyria, 
but confuses the issue, and imputes to the prophet 
motives which were altogether foreign to his mode of 
thought. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that 
Isaiah's view-point in regard to the political af- 
fairs of the day was, like that of the other great 
prophets, not that of a statesman, but of a re- 
ligious idealist. 

1 Geschkhte des V dikes Israel, II, p. 511. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 269 



5. ISAIAH'S GUIDING PRINCIPLE — FAITH 

When Isaiah in the years 705-702 condemned 
Judah's alliance with Egypt, which had been formed 
for the purpose of shaking off the Assyrian yoke, he 
was not guided by any insight into the political con- 
stellation, nor by any shrewd understanding of the 
trend which matters were bound to take in the Orient, 
but by that spiritual truth which was to him a law 
throughout, that truth which at the time of the 
Syro-Ephraimitic campaign, 734, (when he scored 
Ahaz for his appeal to Assyria for aid) he crystallized 
in the words 'im lo tha'amtnu ki Id tke'amenu: 

"If ye have not faith, verily ye shall not endure" 
(VII, 9 b). 

In accordance with this spiritual law, the only 
policy which Isaiah recommended in the crisis of the 
Syro-Ephraimitic campaign, and again in the critical 
years of 704-702, was that of hasqet ubhitha, of "re- 
fraining from action and trusting (in God)," that is 
of abandoning all efforts at self-defence and relying 
absolutely on God (VII, 4, XXX, 15L, cf. also VIII, 
i 2 f. and XXVIII, i6f.). 

This idea of faith is, essentially, the same principle 
that underlies the view-point of all the literary proph- 
ets in regard to the material strength and political 
safeguarding of the nation. But Isaiah developed 
the idea more fully and forcibly than any of the others. 
He was the first to make it clear that trust in God 
meant for a nation righteous government — conform- 
ity with the divine standard of holiness, cf. XXVIII, 
17 and V, 16: 



270 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

"And I shall make justice the rule and righteousness 
the standard. 

On that day the Lord Sabaoth will be exalted by jus- 
tice, 

and the Holy God will show Himself Holy by right- 
eousness." 

He was the first to define holiness in the purely ethical 
sense and to draw the practical conclusions from it for 
humanity (cf. especially VI, 3-8 of the consecration- 
vision) . And he, more clearly than any other, defined 
the belief that it is not by material forces, or, to use a 
modern term, not by economic necessity, that man- 
kind endures and progresses, but by purely spiritual 
forces; and that, wherever these essential spiritual 
forces are not in the ascendancy, the life of nations as 
well as of individuals is doomed to destruction. 
Isaiah's conception of progress is characteristically 
expressed in his poetic description of the future com- 
monwealth (IX, 1-6): 

"The people that walk in darkness shall see a great 

light; 
Upon those that dwell in the land of the shadow of 

death 
Light shall shine forth " (v. 1). 

This faith which stamps Isaiah as a religious idealist 
rather than as a practical statesman is sufficient an- 
swer to the theory advanced by Staerk and Wilke in 
explanation of the change of attitude which they be- 
lieve he underwent toward Assyria. These scholars 
argue that in the first three decades of Assyria's as- 
cent under Tiglath-Pileser III and his successors, Sal- 
manassar IV and Sargon, Isaiah recognized in the 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 271 

aggressive policy and invincible power of Assyria an 
ethical factor, which, as a contrast to the decadent 
life in the small kingdoms of Syria and Palestine, he 
hailed with enthusiasm, but that, in consequence 
of his close and intimate acquaintance with the 
Assryian Hon at the time of the invasion of Judah by 
Sennacherib's armies, and the insight afforded him 
then in the real design of Assyria, he radically changed 
his attitude toward the Assyrian world-power. 1 — 
To ascribe such reasoning to Isaiah is to make Isaiah 
an exponent of Nietzsche's Herrenmoral. Nietzsche's 
ethics, however, and Isaiah's religious views, or for 
that matter, prophetic religious views in general, 
differ from each other as widely as the poles. Assyria's 
imperialism was the very opposite of divine rule, was 
directly contrary to the standard of divine holiness 
according to which Isaiah measured and judged every 
procedure. Neither Isaiah, nor indeed any other 
prophet, could ever have viewed Tiglath-Pileser's or 
Sargon's conquests in any other light than as the 
embodiment of brute force and unrestrained greed. 2 
And in this connection it will not be amiss to mention 
that the imperialistic dream so in evidence in the 
Messianic hope of post-exilic times was entirely absent 
from the future hope of the great prophets, whose 
conception of ideal government was altogether spir- 
itual. Furthermore, it would not have taken Sen- 
nacherib's appearance in Judah and the havoc wrought 
by him in the country to convince Isaiah of the true 
character and design of the Assyrian world-power. 
The conquest of Gilead and Galilee and the deporta- 

1 See Staerk, op. ciL, pp. 57!:., 64, 75, 81, 85s., and Wilke, op. cit.> 

pp. iff.,23ff.,5i,54ff-,95ff. 

2 Cf. the interpretation of X, 5-19, infra, pp. 285^. 



272 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

tion of their inhabitants by Tiglath-Pileser, and still 
more the conquest of Samaria and the exile of the 
people by Sargon to remote parts of the Assyrian 
empire, would have more than sufficed to open his 
eyes in this respect, for we may rest assured that 
Isaiah did not view the downfall of the sister-kingdom 
from the standpoint of an indifferent onlooker. Both 
Tiglath-Pileser and Sargon, it should be pointed out, 
were mightier conquerors than Sennacherib. Their 
wars, and also those of Salmanassar, were no less 
bloody than those of Sennacherib, though they did 
not happen to emphasize this feature in their records 
to the extent that the latter did. And, what is still 
more important, it was Tiglath-Pileser who intro- 
duced the system of transplanting the conquered 
nations to other, remote countries for the purpose of 
effecting their disintegration, and both he and Sargon 
carried out this policy quite as brutally and rigor- 
ously as did after them Sennacherib. 

6 . NO DISCREPANCY IN ISAIAH'S PROPHECIES 

There is then nothing in the circumstances of the 
case or in the prophet's views in general to corroborate 
the assumption that Isaiah changed his mind regard- 
ing the doom. And if we consider the question from 
the other end, that is, in regard to the utterances 
which gave rise to the assumption, we shall find that 
the discrepancy which has called forth so much apol- 
ogy and explanation is in reality more seeming than 
real. The prophecies and passages that come in 
question are: 

(a) X, 5-19; (b) X, 20, 24-27 (exclusive of 'ol 
mipp e ne samaen 1 which close the verse), and XIV, 

The words, which yield no sense as they read at present, belonged 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 273 

24-27; (c) X, 27C-34; (d) XIV, 28-32; (e) XVII, 12- 
XVIII, 6; (f) XXIX, 5a-b, 7-8; and (g) XXXI, 5-9. 
Of these we shall reserve X, 5-19 for the last and 
consider the second group first. 

(a). X, 20, 24-27 +XTV, 24-27. A POSTEXILIC PRODUCT 

Biblical scholars are agreed that X, 20 and 24-27 are 
not by Isaiah, but are a product of postexilic times, 1 
but they make the mistake of including also w. 21-23 
in this spurious passage. These verses, however, as 
has been shown above, 2 are no part of 20 and 24-27, 
but are a fragment of a genuine utterance of Isaiah 
which got wrongly put in here. The fragment, XIV, 
24-27, contrary to the opinion of Cheyne that it origi- 
nally formed a part of X, 51!., 3 does not show organic 
connection with that prophecy, nor for that matter, as 
is generally admitted, with any other prophecy of 
Isaiah. Cheyne can uphold his view only by omitting 
25b from the fragment in question, on the ground that 
it is a later insertion, and by throwing out X, 15 (or 
i6)-i9 as a later addition to X, 5-14 (or 15), thus 

originally to v. 28, from which they were wrongly separated; their 
first part, there can be no doubt, is to be read ' aid mi and in p^ne 
samaen the name of a place must be contained; Duhm suggests p e ne 
rimmon. 

1 As elsewhere in postexilic literature (cf. Is. XIX, 23!!., Zach. 
X, iof., Ps. LXXXIII, 9, Ezr. VI, 22) by 'assilr in v. 24 is not meant 
ancient Assyria, but the heirs of the Assyrian realm, the kingdom of 
the Seleucidae. Note that the Greek name %vpia (Talmudic 'aeraes 
surid) is the shortened form of 'Acra-vput and that by kHhabh 
suri in Talmudic literature "the Syriac" or "Aramaic characters" 
are meant. 

2 See supra, pp. 259! 

3 See "Introduction to the Book of Isaiah," p. 79. 



274 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

placing XIV, 24-27 immediately after v. 14 (or 15). 
X, 15-19, however, as we shall see later, forms one 
piece with X, 5-14, of which it is the immediate con- 
tinuation, while 25b is a vital part of XIV, 24-27, con- 
taining as it does the clue both to the authorship and 
to the original place of XIV, 24-2 7. From the contents 
of the half -verse: "And his yoke shall be removed from 
them, his burden be removed from their shoulders," 
it immediately becomes plain that XIV, 24-27 are 
closely related in thought and language to X, 20, 
24-27, and in fact they fit in perfectly between v. 20 
and v. 24. Moreover, by inserting XIV, 24-27 here, 
the lakhen, "therefore," introducing X, 24, which at 
present has no point, whether vv. 21-23 are left in or 
omitted, becomes at once most logical: — in XIV, 24-27 
Yhwh avers that His plan to bring about the crush- 
ing defeat of the Assyrian world-power (i. e., of the 
Seleucidic Kingdom, as pointed out above) in His own 
country and on His own mountain shall abide, and 
that this plan cannot, be thwarted; and X, 2411*., 
likewise put in the mouth of Yhwh, continues that, 
this being the case, Yhwh's people that dwells in 
Zion need not fear the Assyrian, who (at present) 
smites it with the rod and holds his stick over it, as did 
Egypt of old; for but a little while yet, and Yhwh's 
wrath with His people will be spent, and his scourge 
will be brandished against Assyria, and will vanquish 
it, as Midian and Egypt of old were vanquished. — It 
hardly needs to be remarked that the thought atmos- 
phere in X, 20, XIV, 24-27, X, 24-27 is strikingly at 
variance with that of Isaiah's prophecies. All these 
verses reflect the expectations characteristic of 
postexilic Judaism and quite commonly expressed 
in the literature of that time. 



, 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 275 

(b) X, 27C-34. ONE OR TWO FRAGMENTS — IRRELEVANT TO 
THE QUESTION AT ISSUE 

X, 27C-34 is a fragment consisting of two parts, 
vv. 270-32, and vv. 33-34. The former, which has 
some points of contact with Mic. I, 10-16, describes 
how T an invading enemy will that very day by forced, 
rapid marches descend upon Zion-Jerusalem and deal 
it a destructive blow. In consistency with the trend of 
thought of 27C-32, vv. 33-34, if an original part of 
these, can only be understood, as J. D. Michaelis 1 
and others interpreted them, as describing by the 
figure employed, not the defeat of the invader, but 
the laying low of Zion-Jerusalem — an interpretation 
demanded, moreover, by the concluding words, 
"and the Lebanon shall fall by a mighty one," since 
"the Lebanon" is invariably used as descriptive of 
Palestine. If vv. 33-34, however, are not an orig- 
inal part of 27C-32, but are merely another fragment, 
it is clear that we have no clue whatever either to their 
origin or to the particular circumstances to which the 
verses have reference, so that in no case can these 
verses come into consideration for the question con- 
cerning us here. Neither is there any certain clue, 
it should be added, to the time of origin of vv. 27C-32, 
but if Isaiah is the author of them, the time of the 
conquest of Samaria would suggest itself as a far 
more probable date than the time of the invasion of 
Judah by Sennacherib. The march-route described 
is the route that would be traversed by an army ad- 
vancing from Samaria against Jerusalem. 

1 See "Deutsche Ubersetzung des Alt. Test's, mit Anmerkungen," 
ad loc. 



276 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

(c) XIV, 28-32. ANOTHER POST-EXILIC PRODUCT 

This oracle, if genuine, would certainly have some 
bearing on the question at issue, since it closes with 
the emphatic declaration that "Yhwh hath founded 
Zion, and in it the afflicted of His people shall find 
shelter." However, the oracle cannot make claim to 
the authorship of Isaiah for the simple reason that the 
historical situation described in it is quite different 
from the conditions which existed at any time during 
Isaiah's ministry. It may be briefly remarked that 
the older, in part traditional, interpretation, sug- 
gested by the pseudo-date of the oracle ("in the year 
of King Ahaz' death"), which takes the "basilisk" 
as applying to Hezekiah, and "the serpent" and "the 
rod" of Philistia's slayer, accordingly, as applying to 
Ahaz, is altogether excluded; for such a meaning of 
v. 29 would presuppose that Ahaz was victorious over 
Philistia, while, as a matter of fact, just the opposite 
was the case {cf. II Chron. XXVIII, 18). Apart 
from this, the author of the oracle expects the enemy 
threatening Philistia to invade the country from the 
north (v. 31), but an attack by Judah, Philistia's 
immediate neighbor to the east, could be carried out 
only from the eastern frontier. 

It is obvious, too, that the situation described in 
v. 29 does not correspond to that presented by Assyria 
at the death of Tiglath-Pileser III or of Sargon; for, 
in accordance with the meaning which nisbar, if used 
of men and countries, invariably has (cf. e. g. Is. 
XXIV, 10, Jer. XIV, 17, XL VIII, 4, 17, Dan. VIII, 
8), "the rod that smote thee hath been broken" {nis- 
b c ra) can mean only that the power that subdued and 
tyrannized over Philistia has been vanquished, and 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 277 

Assyria, we know, did not suffer any disruption nor 
even any setback at the death of either Tiglath- 
Pileser or Sargon. The same holds true of Assyria 
after the death of Salmanassar IV; its power stood as 
firm and solid as ever, even though the death of this 
monarch meant the coming of a new line of rulers to 
the throne. Least of all does the battle at Dur-ilu in 
the second year of Sargon's reign furnish the key to 
the situation in v. 29, as Winkler, 1 Cheyne, 2 and Staerk 3 
believe, for the encounter of Sargon with Humbani- 
gash was an altogether insignificant event, a mere 
drawn battle, as is obvious from the fact that both 
sides claimed the victory. And in view of the fact 
that "the rod that smote thee hath been broken" 
admits of no other interpretation than the one stated, 
viz., that the power which has heretofore held domin- 
ion over Philistia has been vanquished, Duhm is 
right in pointing to Alexander's victory over Persia at 
Issos in the year 333 B. C. and the time prior to his 
conquest of Tyre and Gaza as the most likely key to 
the situation described in the oracle. 4 

It remains to be added that "Out of the root of the 
serpent hath come a basilisk, and a flying dragon is its 
fruit" (v. 29b) is a typical example of the enigmatic, 
figurative style so characteristic of the historical 
descriptions in apocalyptic literature, 5 the oldest 
products of which date from the close of the Persian 
and the beginning of the Greek period: "out of the 

1 "Alttestamentliche Untersuchungen," pp. 137s. 

2 Op. cit., pp. 8off. 

3 Op. cit., pp. 6of. 

4 See "Das Buch Jesaia," p. 97. 

5 The genesis of such descriptions frequently, no doubt, is to be 
sought in mythological notions. 



278 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

root of the serpent" is not another figure applying to 
Philistia's slayer, but the whole half-verse is a most 
adequate figurative description of the invincible 
Alexander, as he impressed his contemporaries, and 
of his father, the great Philip. 

(d) XVII, I2-XVIII, 6. A NUMBER OF FRAGMENTS WHICH 
ADMIT OF NO CONCLUSION 

XVII, 12-XVIII, 6 has in common with XXIX, 
5a-b, 7-8, and XXXI, 5-9 that it is fragmentary, but 
differs from XXIX, 5, etc., where the situation is 
in part clear, and from XXXI, 5-9, where it is al- 
together clear, and where, besides, the prophet's 
reasoning underlying the utterance is perfectly lucid, 
in that it does not afford us any real insight into 
either of these all-important particulars. 

In the first place, the question is whether XVII, 
12-14 and XVIII, 1-6 are one or two fragments; and 
the fact is that, whether considered from the point of 
view of form or contents, they make the impression of 
being separate pieces, independent of one another: 
"This is the portion of our despoilers, and the lot of 
our plunderers" (XVII, 14b) reads like the conclusion 
of a sermon, or more correctly like the conclusion of a 
psalm, and XVIII, if., on the other hand, begins like 
a new sermon. 

From the point of view of the contents the two 
pieces present insuperable difficulties. XVII, 12-14 
leave us wholly in the dark about the identity of the 
hosts of nations arrayed, as well as about the object 
and scene of their attack, the mention of them in the 
concluding verse as "our despoilers" and "our plun- 
derers" being the only descriptive reference to them. 
XVIII, 1-6 are quite obscure, except for vv. 1-2, 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 279 

which are addressed to "the land . . . beyond the 
rivers of Kush" or rather to the envoys sent from this 
land, bidding them depart whence they came. The 
obscurity, it is important to note, arises from the 
fact that vv. 3-6 are comprised of several fragments 
(whether of one or more than one utterance cannot be 
decided), and these fragments as they stand at present 
show no logical connection either with vv. 1-2 or 
among themselves. Verse 4 can have formed the 
continuation of v. 3 only in the case that the latter was 
preceded originally by some verses which indicated 
what it was that " the inhabitants of the world and the 
dwellers on earth shall see and hear," as also what 
occurrences are referred to by "when the banner is 
raised and the trumpet is blown." Further, after v. 4 
and again after v. 5 there is clearly a gap ; for the for- 
mer leaves us in the dark as to the particular occur- 
rences or processes toward which God will observe the 
placid, serene attitude described, and the latter does 
not show what is meant to be conveyed by the figure 
of the grape-vine ripening to vintage and of the 
lopping off of the branches and cutting off of the 
tendrils. However ingenious are the respective 
interpretations of Marti 1 and Duhm 2 of vv. 4 and 5, 
both scholars read more into the text than is per- 
missible. Finally, v. 6 cannot possibly have formed 
the immediate continuation of v. 5, for, aside from 
everything else, the striking contrast in style, the 
highly poetic and figurative language of the one and 
the plain prose of the other, preclude that they could 
have directly followed one another; even lesser authors 
than Isaiah would not be guilty of producing anything 
so discordant. To this must be added that neither 
1 Op. cit., ad loc. 2 Op. cit. t ad loc. 



280 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

vv. 5 and 6 nor the preceding verses furnish any clue 
as to who the people are that are to be left as prey to 
the carrion-birds and beasts — a point which bears 
further evidence to the fragmentariness of the whole 
passus. In view of this fragmentary character and the 
general obscurity of vv. 3-6, it remains uncertain even 
whether these verses are in any way related to 1-2, i. e., 
whether they are, either all or in part, the residua 
of a prophecy which, as it would seem from vv. 1-2, 
Isaiah delivered on the occasion of the arrival of 
envoys from "beyond the rivers of Kush" in Je- 
rusalem. But however this may be, it is certain that 
neither XVII, 12-14 nor XVIII, 1-6 permit any 
inference in regard to the question concerning us 
here, the question viz., of Isaiah's believed change of 
attitude regarding Assyria and change of mind regard- 
ing the doom awaiting Judah. 



(e) XXIX, 5a-b, 7-8. A FRAGMENT OR MORE PROBABLY AN 
INTERPOLATION 

XXIX, 5 (exclusive of the last three words, lAfhaja 
l e phaetha pitWom, which belong to the following v. 6), 
7-8 give expression to the belief that certain hostile 
hosts that are arrayed against Zion-Ariel shall meet 
with such utter defeat, that they and the terror caused 
by them will appear like a nightmare. Inasmuch as 
these verses utterly contradict vv. 1-4, 5C-6 (the 
latter being the immediate continuation of the former) 
and also vv. 9-14, it is obvious that they cannot be 
an original part of the prophecy XXIX, iff. — This 
prophecy in vv. 1-4, 5C-6 predicts the very opposite 
of 5a-b, 7-8, viz., that God Himself shall take the field 
against Zion-Ariel and destroy His " altar-hearth"- 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 281 

city, and in vv. 9-14 gives the reason for this action: 
He is going to deal destruction to His people because 
of their spiritual blindness and their ritualistic piety. 
The insertion of vv. 5a-b, 7-8 may be explained 
in either of two ways. They may be the fragment of 
another prophecy of Isaiah's on the same issue as 
that with which he deals in XXXI, 5-9, and the frag- 
ment may have been inserted here purposely by edi- 
tors of a later age in order to take the sting out of the 
prophecy, w. iff., and to give it a construction more 
in harmony with the beliefs of their own times. Or 
these later editors may for the same reason have 
added these verses themselves, for there is no doubt 
that this prophecy, more than any other prophecy of 
Isaiah's, must have given offence to later ages, since it 
dealt a scathing blow to their holiest and most cher- 
ished beliefs. The second possibility seems to me the 
more likely one for the following reasons: (1) The 
verses have in common with the prophecy, vv. iff., the 
name Ariel applied to Zion -Jerusalem, but, while in vv. 
iff. it is used by Isaiah with apparent sarcasm (see 
infra, pp. 293L), in v. 7 it is evidently used with the 
significance associated with the name in the minds of 
the people. It is, however, not likely that Isaiah would 
at any time have used the word in this sense, least of 
all after he had used it as a taunt a short time be- 
fore. (2) It may reasonably be assumed, if Isaiah had 
spoken these verses, whether at the time of the siege of 
Jerusalem by Sennacherib's armies, or at any time 
when the country was threatened by an attack from 
Assyria, that he would not have referred to the 
Assyrian hosts in such general, indefinite terms as 
"the multitude of all the nations" (vv. 7 and 8), 
"the multitude of thine enemies" and "the multitude 



282 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

of tyrants" (v. 5), but would have referred to them by 
name as in XXXI, 5-9. 

But even if the fragment were a product of Isaiah's, 
it would still not permit the inference that at the time 
of the Assyrian crisis Isaiah cherished the belief that 
Assyria would meet with destruction at Zion, for the 
possibility would have to be reckoned with that what 
at present seems to be an absolute prediction, might 
appear, if we had the complete prophecy or a sufficient 
part of it, to be meant conditionally only. This view 
of the case, it will be seen presently, is directly sug- 
gested by XXXI, 5-9. 

(f) XXXI, 5-9 A CONDITIONAL PREDICTION 

Contrary to the view taken of XXXI, 4 by some 
scholars, 1 it is certain that it cannot form a part of 
vv. 5-9. sabhd c al invariably implies hostile inten- 
tion, never protective purpose (cf. XXIX, 71., Num. 
XXXI, 7, Zach. XIV, 12), and therefore the verse 
predicts the very opposite of what v. 5 promises. It 
must belong to the preceding prophecy, vv. 1-3, to 
which it forms a fitting continuation — the prophet 
declares in effect that the alliance with Egypt will not 
avail, the less so since God Himself is arrayed against 
Zion. In the emphasis which this latter thought 
receives, the verse forms a parallel to XXIX, iff., just 
as in the expression of the futility of their alliance with 
Egypt verses 1-3 form a parallel to XXX, 1-7 and 16. 
The meaning of the simile employed in v. 4 is that it 
would be as impossible to thwart Yhwh's design 
against them by means of Egypt's aid as it would be 

1 Among others by Dillmann-Kittel, Der Prophet Jesaia, ad loc, 
and Duhm, op. cit., ad loc. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 283 

to rescue the prey from the jaws of a Hon even by the 
efforts of a host of shepherds. 

Verse 7, which breaks the sequence of thought, is 
not an original part of vv. 5-9; the verse got in here by 
mistake from XXX, i8ff., where it fits in perfectly 
after v. 22. 1 

With verse 7 eliminated, XXXI, 5-9 is well- 
connected and complete in itself, though the original 
beginning of the prophecy is missing. 2 The prophecy 
holds out the prospect of the protection of Jerusalem 
against Assyria and of the defeat of the latter by the 
direct intervention of Yhwh; and many scholars 
have seen in this a proof that in the crisis of the year 
701 Isaiah predicted that in the last extremity Yhwh 
would Himself protect Jerusalem and strike down the 
Assyrian invader. They have, however, overlooked a 
most essential fact, viz., that the imperative subhu of 
v. 6 forms with, jagen of v. 5 and naphal and the follow- 
ing verbs of vv. 8 and 9 a compound conditional prop- 
osition, it being the protasis of both the preceding v. 5 
and the following vv. 8 and 9; and that hence vv. 5 and 
8-9 make no absolute prediction, only a conditional 
one: — Yhwh's rising in defence of Jerusalem and His 
destroying Assyria is contingent on Israel's renouncing 
its deep-rooted apostasy and returning to God : 

"Like hovering 3 birds, so God Sabaoth will shelter 

Jerusalem, 
shelter and deliver, spare and rescue it, 

X XXX, 18-33 together with its original opening part, XXIX, 
17-24, is a postexilic product. 

2 It may be pointed out that even if v. 4 could be taken as a part of 
vv. 5-9, the prophecy would still be without a beginning. 

3 l aphoth is potential participle, its meaning properly being "in a 
flying position" (see supra, p. 108.). 



284 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

if ye return to Him from whom ye have fallen away so 

radically; 
then Assyria will fall by the sword of no mortal, 
and the sword of no earthly being will consume it — ■ 

It will flee from the sword, 1 
and his picked soldiers will be put to hard service; 
and his rock will vanish out of fear, 
even his captains will flee affrighted from the standard, 
saith the Lord who hath a fire in Zion and a furnace in 

Jerusalem." 

The prophecy in no wise contradicts Isaiah's life- 
long convictions, but, on the contrary, is quite con- 
sistent with them. Isaiah points out the one course by 
the adoption of which the present crisis could and, 
without fail, would be averted. He did the same thing 
at the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic campaign, and 
again on the completion of the alliance with Egypt, 
which precipitated the alarming situation of the year 
701 (cf. XXX, 1 si.). For though he, like the other 
prophets, was well aware that his preaching fell on 
deaf ears, he was convinced, even as they, that if 
only a spiritual regeneration of his contemporaries 
might be effected, no power on earth could thence- 
forth prevail against them; — their future would be 
assured. Jer. XXI, 12 furnishes a striking parallel: 

1 "From the sword," i. e. from God's sword, — the sword of swords: 
a case of emphatic indetermination (see supra, p. 107); cf. the 
parallel case Job XIX, 29, "Fear the sword" (mipp e ne haeraebh) — i. e. 
the avenging sword of God — "for these are (read hema) sins that 
will be avenged by the sword." The objection raised against v. 8b 
by Marti {op. cit., ad loc.), Duhm (op. cit., ad loc), and Guthe (in 
Kautzsch 3 , ad loc.) does not hold: "It will flee from the sword" is in 
reality a variation of the statement, "it will fall by the sword," for it 
means, it will be completely put to rout; no matter how crushing the 
defeat, an army is never destroyed to the last man. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 285 

here Jeremiah taunts the people for their futile defence 
of the city (during the last stage of the siege of Jeru- 
salem by the Chaldaeans) declaring that their doom is 
sealed, yet he takes occasion to point out by what 
course they might even yet be saved, if they would 
(cf. supra — pp. 6of., 76). 

(G) X, 5-19. GOD'S ULTIMATE RECKONING WITH THE ASSYRIAN 
WORLD-POWER 

There is no discrepancy, either, between X, 5-19 and 
the rest of Isaiah's preaching. Though the prophecy 
evidently dates from a time when Jerusalem was 
threatened by Assyria (see v. 11), and for this reason, 
because of the reference to the conquest of Karkemish 
(717), must be considered a product of the year 711 
or, what is more likely, of the year 701, the conviction 
expressed in it might have found utterance at any time 
of Isaiah's ministry. Isaiah reviews in it the mighty 
conquests of Tiglath-Pileser and his successors in 
exactly the same light as he must have looked upon 
Assyria's imperialism and brutal despotism from the 
very first. He declares that Assyria is not bent upon 
destroying Israel because it feels itself the rod of 
God's anger, destined for that purpose, but because it 
is rilled with wanton desire for conquest and unlimited 
power. It is ready to trample nations under foot, to 
wipe them out by transplanting the people from their 
native soil as one would rob a bird's nest, and it gloats: 

"By the strength of my hand I have done this, 
and by my wisdom, for I am prudent." 

For this wicked presumption, Isaiah asserts, God is to 
mete out punishment to Assyria, but, it is important 
to note, he makes it clear that God's plan to punish 



286 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

Assyria in no wise interferes with His intention of 
first using this nation for the overthrow of His people. 
In v. 12 which, for reasons that must be considered 
altogether arbitrary, has been eliminated by recent 
exegetes from X, $&., Isaiah states expressly that 
God will not proceed to visit punishment upon 
Assyria until "He has completed His whole work on 
Mt. Zion and in Jerusalem," that is to say, until by 
the destruction of Zion- Jerusalem, in addition to that 
of Samaria (which has already been effected), He has 
completed His work of destroying His people through 
the agency of Assyria (cf. vv. 5 and 6, and also the 
similar meaning of ma a sehu in Chap. V, 19). As 
to the authenticity of v. 12, it must be pointed out 
that the verse by no means forms a break in the 
sequence of thought. The theme of the prophecy, 
Assyria's lust of dominion and its inevitable conse- 
quences, is developed in two well-rounded parts: 
vv. 5-12, and 13-19. The first part sets forth that 
Assyria, not realizing that it is merely the tool in 
God's hand, has set its heart on conquest, and that 
for this reason God shall hold a reckoning with 
Assyria as soon as its commission is performed. The 
second part, in vv. 13-15, expatiates on Assyria's 
policy of conquest from its two principal aspects, i.e. 
from the aspect of Assyria's insatiable greed for do- 
minion, as manifested especially in its brutal disregard 
for the individualities of nations, and from the aspect 
of its inordinate presumption bordering on self- 
deification. The concluding verses of the second part, 
16-19, gi ye a m ° re complete description of the fate 
awaiting Assyria: the collapse of Assyria as a world- 
power is sure to come, and the conflagration, which is 
to sweep away the vast, proud realm it has built up, 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 287 

will be fanned by "the Light and the Holy One of 
Israel" Himself. Further, since v. 12 is thus an 
integral part of X, 5-19 and its explanation clearly 
indicated by the general trend of thought, which is 
perfectly lucid, it follows that the eschatological 
interpretation of the verse, which has come into vogue 
of recent years, is unwarranted. Finally, though it 
must be granted that some parts of vv. 5-19 read more 
smoothly than v. 12, others, both from the point of 
view of diction and of rhythm, are quite on a level 
with it; x cf. e. g. vv. 10 and i4a-b. As to "the King 
of Assyria," this does not indicate any change of sub- 
ject, for throughout this prophecy Isaiah addresses 
himself actually to the absolute ruler of Assyria, in 
whose person all power of the state is centered. In 
fact, I can find no disparity anywhere in X, 5-19; 
the figures are adequate throughout, and the whole is 
Isaianic both in spirit and in language. 

7. ISAIAH'S LAST PROPHECY — CHAPTER XXII, I-14 

Chapter XXII, 1-14 may be referred to as a final 
proof that Isaiah at no time during the crisis of the 
year 701 predicted the deliverance of Judah and 
Jerusalem from Assyria by the intervention of Yhwh. 
The piece is to be considered as one whole, as Hack- 
mann 2 and Dillmann-Kittel 3 take it, with the excep- 
tion, however, of v. 6. 

1 To the genitive-construction, peri godael l e bhabh maelaekh 'assiir, 
which Duhm calls an "Ungetum, das trefflich in die Grammatiken 
passt, aber nicht in eine beschwingte Prophetenrede," (op. cit., ad 
loc.) cf. the similar construction, ia taeraeth ge'uth slkkore 'ephraim, 
XXVIII, 1 and 3, of a passage which is unquestionably genuine and 
even forcible. 

2 Op. cit., pp. 92-97. 

3 Op. cit., ad loc. 



288 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

This verse belongs in the pseudo-prophecy, XXI, 
i-io, 1 from which being omitted it was added in 
the margin, and when the MS. was subsequently 
recopied it became wrongly inserted in Chap. XXII. 
The original place of the verse, or more correctly of 
w ei elam nasd 'as pa w e qir 'era magen, was after bd 
raekhaebh 'is saemaed parasim of XXI, 9, as is shown 
by DWfi D1K m-Q of XXII, 6; the latter words are 
practically identical with bd raekhaebh'is {saemaed) 
parasim: 2 is not the preposition 2, as in our present 
text, but Kn written without the vowel-letter, like 
.in inn (K), II Ki. Ill, 24, and m, I Sam. XXV, 8; 
'adam is a variant of 'is. As to saemaed, from the fact 
that it is missing in XXII, 6 it is safe to conclude 
that it did not stand originally in XXI, 9 either, but 
that it got in here by mistake from v. 7. This re- 
moves the difficulty presented by the strange use of 
saemaed in reference to persons. 2 DWS U18 nmn then 
are the words which immediately preceded the 
omitted passage, and which were repeated in the 
margin alongside of the passage in order to indicate 
the place where it belonged. 3 

1 Like Jer. L-LI, Is. XXI, 1-10 belongs in the category of vaticinia 
post eventum: what purports to be a prediction of the imminent fall of 
Babylon proves on closer examination to have been written after the 
conquest of Babylon by Cyrus. 

2 In v. 7 parasim means "horses," while here in v. 9 it can only 
mean "horsemen," being in apposition with raekhaebh 'is. 

3 That b(a) raekhaebh 'adam parasim was put between the two 

omitted hemistichs when the latter were inserted in XXII, 6 may 

easily be explained. In order to keep the omitted passage separate 

from the words indicating the place where it belonged, the copyist's 

method in putting down both in the margin, whether at the top or at 

the bottom of the page, may have been as follows: 

,/-x , 7, , 7 . *- w e 'elam nasd 'aspd _ 
b(a) raekaebh adam parasim ( r or 

weqir era magen; 






ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 289 

The prophecy, XXII, 1-14, describes in opening 
how the people are given up to revelry because of 
their joy over the propitious turn affairs have taken. 
Though the particular affairs alluded to are not 
specified at this juncture, it is at once apparent that 
the joy and excitement of the people must be due 
either to the sudden termination of the war which 
has been carried on in the country or to some un- 
expected success in the same. For the prophet con- 
tinues, "Thy slain are not those that have been killed 
by the sword, not those that have fallen in battle," 
but (this follows by implication) they are this light- 
hearted people — stricken though not by sword thrust — 
this people blind to the real issue of affairs, and heed- 
less of the day of terror and destruction so near at 
hand: 

"For a day of panic, of treading-down and confusion 
hath in readiness the Lord, God Sabaoth — 
In the vale of vision the walls are bursting, 
and cries resound to the mountains." 

There has been much speculation about "the vale" 
or "valley of vision," and various, necessarily un- 
successful attempts have been made both to explain 
the name and to locate the valley. As soon, however, 
as the expression is taken as a poetic figure, its mean- 
ing is self-evident. The people are rejoicing blindly, 
because, according to superficial indications, they have 
reason to be confident of the future, but to the prophet's 

w e 'elamnasd>aspa ft(fi) raekhaeb W(MW paraUm . 

weqir era magen 
And since the copyists of later times no longer understood the method 
pursued by the earlier coypists in cases of omission, it is but natural 
that they inserted the whole mechanically as they found it. There 
are other cases in support of this explanation. 



290 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

vision the reality is revealed — the destruction, in all its 
harrowing details, that is in store for them. 

In verses j&. the prophet continues by stating the 
reasons for his gloomy outlook, and, though at the 
beginning of this part something must have dropped 
out, 1 there can still be no doubt about this part's 
being the continuation of vv. 1-5 inasmuch as it sup- 
plements them in two essential respects. Not only does 
it deal explicitly with the happenings which have led 
to the prophet's forecast of doom, but it gives a clear 
idea of the particular peril the removal of which 
caused such exultation among the people. We learn 
that Jerusalem itself was in immediate danger; and 
the detailed description of the measures adopted by 
the people in that crisis is identical with the account 
in II Chron. XXXII, 2-5, 30 of the precautions taken 
by Hezekiah in the year 701, when Jerusalem was 
blockaded by a detachment of Sennacherib's army. 
Contrary to the opinion of Duhm, 2 Marti, 3 and others, 
there is no ground for eliminating vv. cjb-iia as not 
being an original part of the prophecy. The difference 
in diction between these verses and the rest of the 
prophecy is owing to the circumstance that the 
prophet refers in them to plain prosaic facts, which 
it would be stilted to clothe in any but matter-of-fact 
language. It is thus clear that the jubilation of the 
people, described in the opening of the prophecy, was 
caused by the sudden raise of the blockade and the 
departure of the Assyrians, which occurrence, as most 

1 The insertion of v. 6 here may well have been due to a gap in the 
text caused by the effacement of some lines or by some other accident 
to the text. 

2 Op. cit., adloc. 

3 Op. cit., ad loc. 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 291 

scholars agree, is the only possible date of the proph- 
ecy. 

Considering the havoc that had been wrought by 
the Assyrian invasion, and the seriousness of the 
situation when Jerusalem itself was blockaded, we 
cannot wonder that the people's joy knew no bounds 
when all of a sudden the blockading force was with- 
drawn, and the Assyrian armies left the country. 
Nor can we wonder that, in their anxiety when the 
Assyrian armies were advancing to besiege the capital, 
Hezekiah and the people overhauled the fortifications 
and provided for an adequate water-supply. But 
Isaiah saw things in a different light! He could see 
nothing but rank apostasy in either action. According 
to his belief the people should not have sought to de- 
fend the city against the enemy, but should have 
turned to God for deliverance, should have trusted 
their case entirely to Him. From the great peril which 
threatened them, he declares, they should have com- 
prehended God's " long-formed plan" toward them, 
and should have returned penitently to God, as he had 
admonished them to do (in XXXI, 5-9). But they 
have remained blind throughout, and this feasting in 
which they now indulge because of their deliverance, 
and by which they frivolously extol the principle of 
enjoying life while it lasts, 1 but shows the extent of 

1 Similar parallels to the carpe diem of Horace are found in both the 
ancient Egyptian and ancient Babylonian literature. In a frequently 
quoted product of the former it is said: "Enjoy the glad day and 
think of joy ere the day comes when you journey to the land that 
loves silence," and in a product of the latter: "When the Gods created 
man, they ordained death for man, but life they took for themselves — 
thou, O Gilgamesh, glut thyself, seek joy day and night, feast day 
after day, dance (?) and be merry (?) day and night" (cf. Erman, 
"Aegypten und Aegyptisches Leben," p. 320; "Das Gilgamesh-Epos " 



2Q2 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

their callousness. Therefore, the prophet concludes, 
their doom is sealed. 

The evidence furnished by XXII, 1-14 confirmatory 
of what we have shown to have been Isaiah's attitude 
in the crisis of the year 701 could not be more conclu- 
sive. It precludes, in fact, any other explanation. For 
it is not conceivable that if Isaiah, as many scholars 
think, really believed that Assyria by its attack on 
Jerusalem proved itself the enemy of Yhwh (be- 
cause, they argue, for the prophet Zion was the in- 
violable abode of Yhwh), and if the more desperate 
the situation grew, the more confident he became 
of the ultimate triumph of Yhwh's cause, and, 
moreover, if he even predicted the exact outcome of 
events, as the story II Ki. XIX, 5-7 ( = Is. XXXVII, 
5-7) claims he did, then certainly it is not conceivable 
that, just as soon as everything had turned out 
according to his prediction, he would deliver such a 
prophecy as XXII, 1-14. It is much more likely that 
he would rather have pointed triumphantly to the 
glorious vindication of his faith, that he would have 
joined in the general rejoicing over Jerusalem's 
deliverance, and exulted in the fact that Yhwh had 
proved Himself more victorious than ever before. 

Isaiah's prediction of doom, however, though to the 
crowd rejoicing over their deliverance it must, in its 
untimeliness, have fallen like a thunderbolt from a 
clear sky, is not more significant than his scathing 
and equally untimely review of Hezekiah's and the 
people's preparations for the defence of Jerusalem. 
In branding as impious their various precautions, 
notably their providing for a water-supply sufficient 

in Gressmann, "Altorientalische Texte und Bilder," I, p. 49; and 
Marti, op. tit., ad loc, and Gray, op. cit., ad loc). 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 293 

to meet the demands of the siege, he clearly showed 
that he stood quite as aloof from political life at the 
close of his ministry l as he did when starting out on 
the same. In this retrospect, just as in VII, 4 and 9 
(of the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic campaign) and 
in XXX, i5f. (704-702), Isaiah viewed the situation 
purely from a spiritual standpoint: the impending 
judgment, he declared, might have been warded 
off in one way only — had the people in the crisis 
from which they have just escaped proved implicit 
faith in God by abandoning all efforts at self-defence. 

Resume 
It is evident from our examination of Isaiah's 
prophecies in general and from the analysis of X, 5-34, 
XIV, 24-27, 28-32, XVII, 12-XVIII, 6, XXIX, 5 a-b, 
7-8, XXXI, 5-9, and XXII, 1-14 that Isaiah at no 
time of his preaching confessed allegiance to the popu- 
lar belief , that Zion was the inviolable abode of Yhwh, 
and, what follows from this, that Assyria's wanton 
attack on Jerusalem would have to be frustrated by 
Yhwh's own intervention. On the contrary, it is 
clear that in XXIX, iff., as briefly indicated above, 2 he 
predicted the destruction of Zion and its Temple no 
less categorically than his contemporary Micah had 
done some time before, or than Jeremiah did almost a 
century later, and that in addition to this, he assailed 
the people's belief in the sanctity of Zion and the 
efficacy of the sacrificial cult with no less scathing 
sarcasm than Amos, when by his vision, Am. IX, iff., 
he attacked their belief in the sanctity of Beth-El. 

1 There is no evidence of Isaiah's activity after he delivered this 
sermon. Whether the coincidence is significant or purely accidental is 
a point which there is no means of deciding. 

2 See pp. 2801. 



294 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

To the festive crowd assembled with sacrifices and 
gifts for worship before Yhwh's altar at Zion Isaiah 
declares that within a year's time God Himself 
will take the field against His " altar-hearth "-city — 
"then there will be wailing and moaning," and then 
Jerusalem will be to Him "a real altar-hearth " — that 
is to say when the streets of Jerusalem reek with the 
blood of its slaughtered citizens as the altar-hearth 
now flows with the blood of sacrifices. No less pointed 
is his reference to Zion in vv. i and 3 * as " the city 
against which David encamped," by which the 
prophet means to emphasize that in Yhwh's eyes 
Jerusalem with its altar-hearth dedicated to Yhwh is 
quite as truly a Kanaanitish-pagan city as it was when 
David encamped against it. The view, therefore, that 
Isaiah upheld the belief in the inviolable sanctity of 
Jerusalem, or, as it is even generally expressed, that it 
was he who originated this belief, should no longer 
have a place in critical works on Israeli tish Prophecy, 
but should be relegated to the realm of myths, where 
it belongs. 2 

In the same realm belongs the widely prevailing 

1 Instead of the Masoretic kedur read, in accordance with the LXX 
and v. 1, as most exegetes do, k e david. 

2 In XXVIII, 16, as has been repeatedly pointed out by recent 
exegetes, no allusion whatever is contained to the inviolability of 
Zion or its Temple. By the second part of the verse, "He who hath 
faith will not be in haste" — or perhaps "will not be moved:" Id 
jamus — Isaiah made it perfectly clear that by " the proven stone, the 
precious corner-stone laid as foundation in Zion" by God, he had 
reference to the spiritual community of the faithful, the circle of 
disciples gathered around him, and of which he said, in VIII, 16-18, 
that in them all his hope concerning the coming of God's future 
dominion was centered. The verse is but another assertion of the 
basic, guiding principle expounded in VII, 9, and emphasized by 
Isaiah on all occasions, that only by faith in God can man's life be 



ISAIAH AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS 295 

view that Isaiah succeeded in acquiring great political 
influence and a commanding position in the state under 
Hezekiah. This view, as frequently pointed out in 
these pages, has no basis in Isaiah's prophecies; it 
rests altogether on the presentation given in II Ki. 
XIX-XX (=Is. XXXVII-XXXIX) of Isaiah's re- 
lation to Hezekiah and of the role which the prophet 
played in the events of the year 701, and this presenta- 
tion, as the majority of modern scholars agree, 1 and 
as even Staerk acknowledges, 2 is purely legendary. 
It has its origin solely in the fictitious picture formed 
by later ages of the prophet and his ministry, and has 
no more in common with the real Isaiah and the facts 
of the case 3 than the picture of Jeremiah in the 
legendary record of Zedekiah's interview with Jere- 
miah and in the legends of Zedekiah's deputations to 
Jeremiah has with Jeremiah. 4 

The real relation of the prophet to the people and 
the government, and vice versa, as revealed in his proph- 
ecies, is briefly this : — on the one hand there was the 

placed on a firm foundation. {Cf. Marti, op. cit., ad loc, Guthe in 
Kautzsch 3 , ad loc, Staerk, op. cit., p. 72.) 

1 Cf. Stade in ZATW., VI (1896), pp. 172ft., Cheyne, op. cit., 212ft., 
221ft., Meinhold, "Die Jesaiaerzahlungen, Jes. 36-39," Duhm. 
op. cit., on Chaps. XXXVI-XXXIX, Marti, op. cit., on Chaps. 
XXXVI-XXXEX. 

2 Op. cit., pp. 8if., 140ft*. 

3 If, at the time of the conquest of Asdod (711) by Sargon's com- 
mander-in-chief, Judah escaped unscathed for its participation in the 
insurrection, it was not because Hezekiah in the eleventh hour, as is 
generally thought, heeded Isaiah's advice, but because in all prob- 
ability conditions arose similar to those which later in 701 led to the 
sudden raise of the blockade of Jerusalem, viz., certain developments 
in the East demanding that Sargon's efforts be concentrated in that 
direction. 

4 See supra, pp. 56ft., 67ft., 78L 



296 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

prophet viewing every contingency from his lofty, 
ideal pedestal, warning the people in all critical situa- 
tions not to rely on human precautions or material 
defence, but to seek safety by resting their case with 
God; and, on the other hand, there were the King 
and the people, heedless of the prophet's words, in- 
capable of grasping their significance, laughing at the 
strange visionary who proposed in all seriousness that 
they abandon their efforts at self-defence, and so 
meet their fate, as it seemed to them, with folded 
arms. We cannot wonder at this attitude of his 
contemporaries, for to enter into Isaiah's proposals, to 
submit to his guidance, would have meant for the 
people to rise to the spiritual heights attained by the 
prophet, and this would have been nothing short of 
the realization of God's dominion then and there. 
Isaiah himself understood this perfectly, and so he 
never failed to make it clear that it was to the future 
that he looked for the recognition of the truth which he 
was preaching; as to the people of his own age, he 
knew that for them his words were bound to be fruit- 
less — meaningless even, since their sole conception of 
the worship of Yhwh was the ritual minutely pre- 
scribed and punctiliously carried out, just as their 
whole notion of Yhwh's holiness was a purely ritu- 
alistic one. Of the holiness of God as Isaiah under- 
stood it, that holiness that makes purity of heart and 
righteous conduct imperative on man, they had no 
conception. And we can easily understand that they 
heaped derision and invective on the prophet who 
importuned them with "the Holy One of Israel" and 
His requirements of man (cf. XXIX, 9-14, XXX, 9-12 
also I, 10-18) . 1 
x It follows from Isaiah's sweeping condemnation of the Yhwh 



MICAH'S VIEW OF THE DOOM 297 

micah's view of the doom 

In the case of Isaiah's younger contemporary, 
Micah, no detailed examination of his prophecies is 
required for our purpose, for both those who ascribe 
only Chaps. I-III of the Book of Micah to Micah, and 
those who rightly hold that certain parts of Chaps. IV- 
VII are his work also, are agreed that he speaks of the 
doom in the most absolute terms throughout his 
prophecies, and that it is quite apparent that he en- 
tertained absolutely no hope that his contemporaries 
might be affected by his preaching. Since these so 
utterly failed to realize "what God demands of man," 
that they believed their lives to be centered in God 
even though their commonwealth was built up on 
crime and wrong, he could see only certain destruction 
in store for them. Accordingly he started, some short 
time prior to the conquest of Samaria, to predict 
that Samaria and Jerusalem alike would be completely 
destroyed, and after the fall of the sister-kingdom, he 
in more sweeping terms than ever reiterated his 
prediction of the complete overthrow of his home- 
state. Whatever Micah's hope for the future may 
have been in detail, it is certain that for him the 
future, ideal Israel would have to be built up on the 
ruins of the present, that it would have to be looked 
for only after the complete destruction of nation and 
country. 

cult of his time that, even if the report, II Ki. XVIII, 4, about 
Hezekiah's reform were authentic, Isaiah would have been as indiffer- 
ent to such a reform as Jeremiah was later to the Deuteronomic 
reformation. 

The detailed discussion of Jeremiah's attitude to the Deuteronomic 
reformation will have a place in Volume II. 



BOOK II 

THE MESSAGE OF THE PROPHETS 

PART I 



AMOS 

JUSTICE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS 

SPIRITUAL RELIGION VERSUS RITUAL- 
ISTIC PIETY 

INTRODUCTORY 

The two sides from which we have undertaken to 
present literary prophecy, the spiritual and the in- 
tellectual, are, by the nature of the case, bound to 
overlap, just as in an analytic study of the human 
mind the various functions of mind and spheres of 
mental activity invariably encroach on one another, 
and resist every attempt at absolute demarcation. 
In analysing the Faith of the Prophets, therefore, we 
have been obliged to make frequent reference to their 
Message; but, however frequent or extensive these 
references have been, they have not commanded at- 
tention as illustrating the prophets' religious views, 
but only as elucidating their religious experience. 
Their religious views have been taken up only in so 
far as they serve to throw light on the personal faith 
of the prophets, and to afford us an insight into the 
source of that wonderful idealism which filled the 
prophets with visions of spiritual regeneration and 
universal righteousness at the very time when every- 
thing pointed to corruption and decay. 

In Book II we shall consider the religious views of 
the prophets per se. We shall seek to trace them 
through the successive stages of their growth and 

301 



30 2 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

development, and to define as nearly as possible the 
contribution of each of the great prophets to the 
progress of religious thought. Our point of departure 
for the Message of the Prophets, therefore, will be 
Amos — on whom, accordingly, our attention to a large 
extent will be centered in Part I. It will be interesting 
to note in this survey, how from the very first the 
basic and distinctive features of the prophetic religion 
were clearly and forcibly set forth. 

I. AMOS. JUSTICE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS 

In personality and temperament, Amos presents a 
striking contrast to Jeremiah. Not less great, per- 
haps, is he, not less fervid and sincere, but full of 
wrath and fire and thunder — austere and pitiless he 
seems, when compared with the tender, emotional 
Jeremiah. 

A humble shepherd, tending his flocks on the 
hillsides of Tekoa, Amos felt the divine call: "God 
called me away from my flocks, bidding me, Go, 
prophesy against my people Israel." And even as 
Jeremiah, a century and a half later, Amos left every- 
thing and dedicated himself to the service of his God. 

But while Jeremiah, as we know, was oppressed 
with grief at the knowledge of his people's sinfulness, 
Amos' soul was filled with wrath. Fiercely he de- 
nounces his countrymen for their iniquities, mercilessly 
he scores the high and mighty for their pride, for their 
cowardly oppression of the poor, their gross pleasure 
in things material, their venal greed; and again and 
again he thunders forth the warning of their doom- 
complete, irrevocable. 

Throughout the prophetic utterances of Jeremiah 
we noticed a definite hope — his boundless confidence 



AMOS 303 

in God's mercy, his sublime trust that he was sow- 
ing the seed, the harvest of which would be reaped in 
some future age. 

In Amos' prophecies there is no clear assurance of 
pardon or mercy or hope, only stern, uncompromising 
justice. Only in one passage is there anything that 
might be construed as a gleam of hope, and here it is 
not expressed outright, but suggested by the general 
tone of the passage : 

"Days shall come, saith the Lord, 

when I will send famine in the land, 

not famine of bread nor drought of water, 

but of hearing the word of God. 

They shall wander from sea to sea, 

from the north even to the sunrise they shall roam 

to find the word of God, 

but shall not find it." (VIII, 11-12). 

It is not unlikely that this passage, as we have it, is 
incomplete, and that the part which we have not, 
contained positive reasoning to the effect that fight 
might ultimately dawn for the benighted wanderers. 
At least, similar passages in other prophets cannot be 
taken as implying that the spiritual darkness described 
will be final and permanent. 1 But we have to reckon 
with the passage as it is, and so are not justified in 
noting anything more than the incomplete suggestion 
of a hope. 

The predominating features in Amos' writings are, 
on the one hand, his denunciation of the shameless 
luxury and injustice that prevailed in his age, and, on 
the other, his clamor for righteous government and 
for a pure, moral fife. It is a mistake to conclude, as is 

*See supra, pp. 113!:. 



304 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

commonly done, that Amos lacked in patriotism and 
in sympathy toward his countrymen. Austere and 
uncompromising he was, without a doubt, but not 
indifferent. He does not give utterance to his feelings 
like Hosea, or Jeremiah or Isaiah; but his dirges and 
his various descriptions of the judgment reveal true 
depth of feeling and show that, even as the other 
prophets, so was he shaken and haunted by the 
thought of his people's doom. 

It was during the great fall-festival that Amos made 
his appearance at Beth-El, that most famous sanc- 
tuary of the Northern Kingdom. From all over the 
country the people had assembled, as was their cus- 
tom, with tithes and sacrifices to offer thanksgiving to 
God for a bountiful harvest and to give themselves 
up to rejoicing. 

At that period of their history, especially, the 
Israelites believed that they had cause to rejoice and 
celebrate thanksgiving, for, owing to the military 
successes of Jeroboam II, the country was enjoying a 
sudden influx of prosperity. And, indeed, we know 
from the writings of the contemporary prophets that 
the feasting and mirth at these festivals celebrated 
in honor of Yhwh, were carried beyond all bounds, 
so that the whole celebration had come to bear a 
worldly rather than a religious aspect. 1 

What a contrast is presented by this rejoicing multi- 
tude and the austere prophet who suddenly appears 
in their midst predicting doom : 

"Hear this word which I recite as dirge over you, 

House of Israel: 
Fallen is the virgin Israel — 

1 Cf. especially Is. XXVIII, 7 f . 



AMOS 305 

powerless to rise again. 
Prostrated to the ground — 
no one to lift her up " (V, 1-2). 

But more significant still are the prophet's opening 
words: 

"Yhwh shall storm from Zion and thunder from 

Jerusalem, 
and the pastures of the shepherds shall mourn, 
and the summit of Karmel shall wither " — 

that is to say, it is Yhwh Himself who will rise and 
destroy the whole country from the pasture-lands in 
the extreme south to the summit of Mt. Karmel in the 
north. 

This prophecy of Amos fell on deaf ears. That his 
compatriots failed to grasp the significance of these 
startling words is to be explained by the radical 
difference in religious views which separated prophet 
and people. This difference was twofold, pertaining 

(1) to the relation between Israel and Yhwh, and 

(2) to the importance that should be attached to the 
cult and ritual. 

For Amos' Israelitish contemporaries Yhwh was 
Israel's God and Israel was Yhwh's people. Yhwh 
Himself, they believed, had created this relationship 
by delivering them out of Egypt. How could it be 
possible, therefore, that Yhwh would destroy His 
own people? Nay, more than this, they argued, in 
granting them victory and protection Yhwh was 
but upholding His own interests, for only in Israel 
was He worshipped, only there did He have His 
dwelling and His shrines. This popular view of the 
reciprocal relationship between Israel and Yhwh is 



306 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

reflected throughout the literature prior to Amos' 
appearance. Thus, e. g., in the song of Deborah, 
which celebrates Deborah's victory over Sisera, we 
read: "Curse Meroz, saith the Angel of Yhwh, curse 
her inhabitants bitterly, because they came not to the 
aid of Yhwh, to the aid of Yhwh among the 
heroes!" (Judg. V, 23). And in the Elisha-story, a 
story dating from Amos' own times, where it is related 
how Elisha on his death-bed prophesied to Joash that 
he would vanquish Aram, Elisha calls Joash 's prospec- 
tive victory over Aram, or, as he puts it, "Joash's 
victorious arrow against Aram," "an arrow of victory 
for Yhwh " (II Ki. XIII, 14-19). 

In accordance with this view, Amos' contempo- 
raries reasoned that it would be absurd to think of 
Yhwh without Israel, for what could Yhwh do, 
how could He be glorified without His people? What 
would become of His dominion if Israel were to per- 
ish? — Such were the tacit questions with which the 
Israelites at Beth-El ridiculed the prophet's fore- 
boding of evil. 

But in contrast to their belief that Yhwh's and 
Israel's interests were identical, Amos declares signif- 
icantly: 

"Verily ye are not better to me, Israelites, 

than the Kushites (i. e. the despised negro-race), 

saith Yhwh. 
I did indeed lead forth the Israelites from Egypt, 
but I also led forth the Philistines from Kaphtor 
and the Aramaeans from Kir " (Am. IX, 7) . 

Thus Amos denies emphatically that Israel enjoys a 
special monopoly of God's favor, and in contrast to 
the popular conception of Yhwh as the national God 



AMOS 307 

of Israel, he sets up the idea of a universal God, who 
controls the destinies of all men, and to whom all the 
world must do homage. 

This universal God, it is important to note, is for 
Amos, as, in fact, for all the prophets, a God of 
eternal righteousness, a supreme moral being, whose 
will it is that right and justice shall triumph through- 
out the world, and who, accordingly, punishes sin and 
injustice wherever he finds it, without regard to who 
is responsible for it, or who suffers by it. 

It has a special significance, therefore, that Amos 
opens his prophecies (Chaps. I, 2-II) by representing 
Yhwh in judgment over Israel and the Kanaanitish na- 
tions alike, and, what is more important, in judgment 
over them, not because of ritual sins or heathen 
ignorance of ritual observances, as the case may be, 
but because they have shown no regard for the 
universal laws of morality. 

By his novel conception of God Amos represents 
Israel's deliverance from Egypt in an altogether new 
light. Yhwh , as God of universal justice, delivered the 
Israelites from Egypt, not because they were Israelites, 
but because they were held in unjust bondage. 

This act of special favor, they should understand, 
did not ensure immunity for them; on the contrary, 
it but imposed greater obligations upon them: 

"Hear this word which Yhwh hath pronounced 

against you, O Israelites, 
against the whole race, which I led forth from Egypt; 
Verily I have taken more care of you 
than of any other race of the earth; x 
hence I will visit all your sins upon you" (III, 2;. 

1 raq has here not restrictive but intensive force, as in Gen. XX, 



308 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

This latter verse sounds like a paradox when taken by 
itself, but in the light of Chaps. I, 2-II the prophet's 
meaning is plain. Amos means to tell the Israelites, 
they have indeed experienced Yhwh's providence 
in an especial degree; but, in the very beginning of 
their history, by leading them out of Egypt Yhwh 
revealed Himself to them as a God of justice, and 
now since they have persistently scorned His laws of 
justice and trampled on humanity, He, as a God of 
justice, is bound to visit all their sins upon them. 

2. SPIRITUAL RELIGION VERSUS RITUALISTIC PIETY 

The second illusion which closed the people's mind 
to the prophet's preaching was the significance which 
they attached to the cult and ritual. Indeed, in 
ancient Israel, as throughout antiquity, ' worship of 
God ' was synonymous with ritual and sacrifices, 
for the people believed that, above everything else, 
Yhwh laid stress on the punctilious observance of the 
ritual and on regularity and zeal in offering sacrifices. 
An excellent illustration of this belief is the record, 
II Ki. XVII, 24-28, 1 about the reco Ionization of 
Samaria by Sargon with people drawn from remote 

11, Deut. IV, 6, Is. XXVIII, 19, et alit.; jada is used to connote 
"God's providential care," as in Hos. XIII, 5, Nah. I, 7 and Ps. I, 6 — 
in the two latter passages the meaning is evident from the parallelism; 
and min is the min of comparison. This meaning of v. 3a is the only 
one consistent with the general drift of the preceding discourse, I, 
2-II, as sketched above, and with Amos' emphatic denial in IX, 7 
that Israel enjoys a monopoly of God's favor. Thus the contradiction 
that has been supposed to exist between III, 2 and I, 2-II, and partic- 
ularly between III, 2 and IX, 7, does not exist in reality. It arose 
from the incorrect translation: "Ye only have I known (or 'do I 
know ') of all the races of the earth." 

1 Verses 29-41 consist of later additions to this record. The 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 309 

parts of the Assyrian empire — a record which is most 
important for our purpose since it dates from the very 
time of the prophets. The author ascribes the in- 
crease of wild animals in the devastated regions of 
Samaria to the fact that the new settlers at first failed 
to worship Yhwh — that is, failed to worship Him in 
the sanctuaries of the country and according to the 
rules of the ritual. And, what is equally significant, 
the Assyrian colonists are represented as viewing the 
matter in the same light. They petitioned for the 
return of one of the priests who had been deported, 
that they might be instructed by him in the ritual 
observances essential for the Yhwh worship. 

In view of the importance which the ritual possessed 
in their minds, it was but natural that the people 
should bestow on it the greatest vigilance and as- 
siduity. Whenever disaster befell them, they accepted 
it as a sign that Yhwh was displeased with them; 
their concern for the cult was wont to grow in propor- 
tion to the severity of the visitation, and they would 
seek to appease Yhwh's wrath by increased offerings 
and gifts and by holy assemblies. 

This belief of the people that they could worship 
God by celebrating festivals and please Him by 
offering sacrifices was vigorously assailed by Amos and 
his successors, for the prophets acknowledged no 
other mode of worship than the worship of God in the 
spirit, that is to say, by faith and by righteous con- 
duct (see Part II, Chap. II, pp. 1531!.). 

In this connection Jeremiah's impassioned Temple- 
sermon may be recalled, where he denounces the 

importance of this record has been pointed out by Hans Schmidt in 
" Die Schriften des Alt. Test's " herausgeg. v. Gressmann, etc., II, 
2, p. 5- 



310 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

people for putting their trust in such delusions as the 
Temple and the cult and bids them dispense with their 
sacrifices, since the only thing that can avail them is 
to amend their lives and practise justice. 1 

To the same effect is Isaiah's utterance: 

"The Lord God speaks, because this people ap- 
proach me with their mouths, 

and honor me with their lips, but their heart is far 
from me, 

and their worship is but a precept 

devised by man and learned by rote, 

therefore I will deal with this people to [their] con- 
fusion, 

so that the wisdom of their sages will vanish, 

and the intelligence of their wise men be confounded " 
(Is. XXIX, 13-14). 

Similarly Hosea declares in the name of God : 

"Love do I desire, and not sacrifices, 

and knowledge of God, not holocausts'' (Hos. VI, 6). 

Then, too, we have the great passage from Micah: 

"Wherewith shall I approach the Lord, 
wherewith shall I bow myself before God on High? 
Shall I approach Him with burnt-offerings, 
with calves of a year old? 
Doth God take delight in thousands of rams, 
or in myriads of streamlets of oil? 
Shall I give my first-born in atonement of my trans- 
gression, 
the fruit of my womb in expiation of my sin? 

1 See supra, Part I, Chap. I, pp. nff. 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 311 

He hath told thee, O man, what is good; 

and what doth the Lord require of thee, 

but to do justice and to love mercy, 

and to walk humbly with thy God!" (Mic. VI, 6-8) 

All this we are inclined to accept to-day as self- 
evident truth; but to the Israelites of Amos' age such 
utterances must have seemed intolerable blasphemy, 
and the prophet who dared to proclaim them, little 
short of a madman. What did he mean by proph- 
esying irrevocable doom to them? Did they not offer 
daily sacrifices to God? Did they not seek con- 
stantly to appease His wrath by holocausts? Did 
they not observe His festivals, the days of solemn as- 
sembly, and offer thanksgiving to Him and sin- and 
peace-offerings? Amos, however, points out to them 
the mockery of their belief that they serve Yhwh 
by festal celebrations and sacrifices, and induce His 
good-will by ritual observances. Referring to their 
visits to the holy shrines, which visits represented the 
very acme of piety to their minds, he says caustically: 

"Go to Beth-El and sin, to Gilgal and sin more, 

in that ye bring the following day your sacrifices, 

the third day your tithes, 

and sacrifice thank-offerings of leavened bread, 

and loudly invite to free-will offerings; 

for so do ye love to do, O Israelites, 

saith the Lord God" (Am. IV, 4L). 

With characteristic vigor he thunders forth in the 
name of God : 

"I loathe, I despise your festivals, 
I cannot abide your sacred assemblies. 
When ye offer me sacrifices and gifts 



312 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

I do not care for them, 

and at your thank-offering of fatted calves I do not 

look. 
Begone from me with the noise of your hymns! 
To the music of your harps I will no longer listen" 

(V, 21-23). 

Justice and righteousness alone, he tells them, have 
value in God's eyes, and only by cultivating these 
can one serve Him and incur His favor : 

"But let justice flow forth like water, 

and righteousness like a perennial stream" (ib., 24). 

And again: 

"Seek good and not evil, that ye may live, 

and God be really with you as ye believe. 

Nay, hate evil and love good 

and establish justice in the gate of justice, — 

Perchance the Lord, God Sabaoth might show mercy 

unto decimated Joseph" (V, 14-15). 

Equally emphatic is Isaiah : 

"Hear the word of God, ye chieftains of Sodom! 
Give ear to the revelation of our God, people of 

Gomorrah ! 
What is the multitude of your sacrifices to me, saith 

the Lord? 
I have enough of your holocausts of rams and the fat 

of fed beasts; 
and in the blood of bullocks and he-goats I delight not. 
That ye come to appear before me, 
who hath required this of you — to tread my courts? 
Bring vain offerings no more! 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 313 

Bringing sacrifices is an abomination to me! 

New moon and Sabbath, the calling of assemblies 

I cannot endure .... 

Your New moons and your festivals my soul doth hate, 

they are a burden unto me ; 

I am weary of bearing it. 

And when ye spread forth your hands 

I hide mine eyes from you ; 

even if ye offer up many prayers, I will not hear: 

Your hands are full of blood. 

Cleanse yourselves ! Purify yourselves ! 

Remove your wicked deeds from mine eyes ! 

Cease to do evil! Learn to do good! 

Practise justice! Hold in check the oppressor! 

Secure the right of the fatherless! 

Plead the cause of the widow! 

Come, let us reason, saith the Lord : 

If your sins are as scarlet, shall they become white as 

snow? 
If they are red as crimson, shall they become white as 

wool? 
If ye be willing and obedient, ye may enjoy the fruit of 

the land ; 
but if ye refuse and be rebellious, ye shall be consumed 

by the sword — 
It is the mouth of God that speaketh " (Is. I, 10-20). 

It is very difficult for us to realize what a tremen- 
dous advance in religious thought was marked by this 
view of the prophets as to what constitutes true 
worship. It must be remembered that it was not only 
for their Israeli tish contemporaries that the worship 
of God had no wider significance than the cult. To 
whatever literature of ancient times we may turn, we 



314 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

see that religion was identified with ritual and sacri- 
fices, and that in these the whole religious life centered. 
Take, e. g., the sacred literature of the Hindus — 
a name, which for most people is synonymous with 
the most profound philosophy and the loftiest religious 
views, but wrongly so, as far as the older period, the 
pre-Buddhistic times, are concerned. In the Rigveda 
the sacrifices are the centre of interest. They were 
regarded as the sum total of all mysteries, and upon 
them were thought to depend both the material and 
the spiritual order of things — a view, which, notwith- 
standing the teaching of the prophets, is also found in 
the Talmud. 1 The numerous rules which had to be 
scrupulously carried out to ensure the efficacy of the 
sacrifice are described in the 6Wra-literature and in the 
addenda to the latter (the Prayogas and the Padd- 
thatis) not less minutely than in the Talmud. 

But from the Old Babylonian literature we have 
perhaps the best illustration of the fact that in ancient 
times the great object of men's concern was the 
ritual. Among the most interesting religious monu- 
ments we have of ancient Babylon are the so-called 

1 As to this belief in the efficacy of sacrifices in the Rigveda, cf. 
Oldenberg, "Die Religion des Veda," pp. 315-317. 

Of the frequent statements to this effect in the Talmudic and 
Midrashic literature, it will suffice to refer to the regulation stated in 
Mishna Taanith, IV, 1, that the twenty-four divisions, chosen from 
all over the country and deputed to go to the Temple in Jerusalem to 
participate in the sacrificial service, and the corresponding divisions, 
which at the set time of the sacrificial service assembled in the coun- 
try towns, recite daily the story of the creation, Gen. I-II, 3. The 
reason for this regulation is stated in both the Palestinian and the 
Babylonian Gemara: "If it were not for the sacrificial cult, the world 
would not exist," etc. — See Taan. bab. 27b, jer. IV, 2, fin., Meg. bab. 
31b; in the latter passage Jer. XXXIII, 25 is quoted as scriptural 
authority, and interpreted as meaning something altogether different 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 315 

Penitential Psalms, which, of late years, have often 
been compared with our Penitential Psalms of the 
Bible. There is, however, a vital difference between 
the two. In the Babylonian Psalms the penitent is 
solely concerned lest he have overlooked some ritual 
observance, and have incurred thereby the displeasure 
of the god or goddess, whereas in the Biblical Psalms 
it is by the consciousness of human imperfection, of 
moral instability that the psalmist is oppressed. The 
Hebrew Penitential Psalms show the influence and 
breathe the spirit of the prophetic teaching. 1 

The primitive conceptions at the root of the sacrifi- 
cial cult are most apparent in the twofold purpose 
which it was thought to serve. Sacrifices were re- 
garded, on the one hand, as the medium by which man 
might enter into or renew communion with the deity, 
as the sacramental meal by which the bond between 
the devotee and his god was established — for par- 
taking at the god's table meant being admitted to his 
friendship; and, on the other hand, as the most 
efficacious means of incurring the favor of the deity. 

In the latter respect it must be remembered that, 
in return for his holocausts and sacrifices, the offerer 
expected from the deity, not spiritual gifts, but purely 
material blessings, such as a plentiful harvest, numer- 
ous flocks, long life, or, for the nation at large, pros- 
perity, conquest, and so on. 

It was this grossly materialistic conception of reli- 
gion that was so repugnant to the prophets. It was 

from what it really says: it is taken to say: "If my covenant were not 
kept up day and night, I would not have established the orders of 
heaven and earth." — "My covenant" is understood as denoting the 
sacrificial cult ordained at Sinai. 

1 The above remarks apply especially to Psalms LI and CXXX, 
which excel in depth of thought and religious feeling. 



316 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

this that Hosea had in mind when he upbraided his 
contemporaries: 

"They do not pray from their hearts; 
when they cry in their vigils, 

they are exercised because of their grain and wine " 
(Hos. VII, 14). 

He would have them pray, not for their temporal 
welfare, not for the gratification of their material 
wants, but to satisfy the needs of their soul. 

But to such a spiritualization of religion the people 
were necessarily impervious. Their own conception 
was like a barrier, against which the prophetic ideas 
beat in vain. Hence the repeated declarations of 
the prophets that it was because of their religious 
delusions and their mistaken cult that the people were 
so blind to the real truth — that is to say, to the fact 
which they considered all-essential, that only righteous- 
ness and purity of heart have weight with God, and 
that only by cultivating these can one serve Him. 
As Hosea represents it, the cause of the people's god- 
less life lies in the fact that their altars and sacrifices 
are of paramount concern to them : 

" A luxuriant vine was Israel, 
whose fruit grew plentifully. 
The more its fruit increased, 
the more numerous it made its altars; 
the more the land prospered, 
the more beautiful massebas they built. 
Ephraim has built many altars — 
its altars have caused it to sin." 1 (Hos. X, 1 and 
VIII, 11). 

1 The second lahHo is to be omitted as a mistaken repetition of the 
first. 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 317 

It may be noted incidentally that Hosea consistently 
refers to the people's sacrifices and other religious 
practices as sin, lewdness, iniquity; cf. IV, 8, 12, V, 

4 -6. 1 

The great value of the oft-quoted passage from 
Micah consists therein that both conceptions, the 
false conception of the people and the vital conception 
of the prophets, are placed side by side, so that the 
immense spiritual advance of the latter over the for- 
mer is brought home to us most forcibly by the con- 
trast: 

"Wherewith shall I approach the Lord, 
wherewith shall I bow myself before God on high? 
Shall I approach Him with burnt-offerings, 
with calves of a year old?" concluding, 

1 "They (the priests) feed on the sin of my people (i. e., they de- 
rive a revenue from the sacrifices), 

they are desirous of their iniquity. 

My people consult their wooden blocks, 

and their staff telleth them the oracle." (The reference is, no 
doubt, to the practice of consulting the oracle by means of 
wooden blocks or staves; cf. I Sam. XIV, 41, as read by the 
LXX.) 

"For a spirit of lewdness hath misled them, 

so that, faithless, they have strayed away from their God. 

Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God, 

for a spirit of lewdness possesseth them, 

and they know not God. 

Thus doth Israel's pride testify to its face, 

Ephraim must come to fall through its guilt, 

Judah also shall come to fall with it. (Omit w^isra'el w e , and 
accordingly read l immo for 'immam.) 

With their sheep and their cattle will they then go to seek Yhwh, 

but they will not find Him; 

for He hath withdrawn Himself from them." 



318 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

"He hath told thee, O man, what is good; 
and what doth the Lord require of thee, 
but to do justice and to love mercy, 
and to walk humbly with thy God." 

Various passages from the other prophets might be 
cited confirming or supplementing this formulation of 
Micah. 1 Each one expresses some phase of that most 
essential truth of prophetic religion, that regarding 
the relation of man to God. We might sum up briefly 
our conclusions from them all as follows: 

Contrary to the views of their times that only 
through the medium of ritual and sacrifice, of temple 
and priest, could man have intercourse with God, the 
prophets, for the first time in the history of human 
thought, gave expression to the fundamental ethical 
truth that God is present in every human heart, and 
that, by virtue of this, it is in every man's power 
to enjoy communion with Him without any mediator- 
ship whatever, the only condition being that he who 
would hold converse with God, must live a life of pu- 
rity and righteousness and walk humbly with God. 

In accordance with this, the glorious future consum- 
mation, which is the ideal of the prophets, will consist 
therein, that the whole people will know God, that 
every man will experience God in his heart and strive 
evermore after justice and righteousness; 2 Jeremiah 
even goes so far as to predict that in the ideal future 

1 Cf. particularly Jer. XXIII, 23 (see supra, Part II, Chap. II, 
pp. 146s.) and also Is. LVII, 15. 

"Thus speaketh the High and Sublime One, 

Who abide th forever and Whose name is Holy One : 

On high and as the Holy One do I abide, 

and with him who is contrite and humble in spirit." 

2 Cf. especially Hos. VI, 3, II, 2 if., and see supra, pp. 2482. 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 319 

all codified law will be dispensed with, since God's 
moral law will be indelibly inscribed in the heart of 
each individual and will assert itself unfailingly in 
every conscience: 

"Days shall come, saith the Lord, 

when I shall make a new covenant 

with the house of Israel and the house of Judah ; 

not like the covenant which I made with their fathers 

the day that I took them by the hand 

to lead them out of the land of Egypt, 

which covenant they broke, so that I cast them off. 1 

But this will be the covenant 

which I shall make with the house of Israel 

in the days to come, saith the Lord : 

I shall implant my law in their minds, 

and I shall write it in their hearts, 

and I shall be to them a God, and they will be to me a 

people- 
Then they will no longer need to teach one another 
with the words, 'Know God!' 
For they will all know me, 
from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith 

the Lord " (Jer. XXXI, 31-34). 

Having reached with this vision of Jeremiah the 
very pinnacle of prophetic idealism (than which no 
visionary of whatever age could go farther), we shall 
go back to the ritualistic religion of ancient Israel, 
to take up another phase of it — a phase which, though 
its full discussion belongs in the second volume, must 
briefly be touched on here in order to set forth in all 
its bearings the prophets' position to the cult. In 

1 Read, in accordance with the LXX and Pesh., gaalti instead of 
bdalti. 



32 o THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

ancient Israel, as throughout antiquity, religion was 
inseparably bound up with the forms of political life, 
with nation and country. In accordance with their 
conception of Yhwh as the national God, the 
Israelitish people believed that He could be wor- 
shipped only within the sphere of His influence, that 
is within the domain of Israel. Thus David, reproach- 
ing Saul for banishing him from the country, says, in 
case men incited him to that course: "Be they cursed 
before Yhwh, for they have driven me away this 
day from sharing in the heritage of Yhwh, saying: 
'Go, worship other gods.'" (I Sam. XXVI, 19). 
In Deut. XXVIII, 64 we find: "The Lord shall 
scatter thee among the nations all over the earth, and 
there thou shalt worship other gods, which neither 
thou nor thy fathers have known, of wood and stone. " 
Similarly Hosea, speaking from the people's point of 
view, asks his contemporaries what they will do at the 
festive season, on the day of the feast of Yhwh, when 
they are exiled from "Yhwh's country," and, con- 
sequently, are unable to sacrifice to Him: 

"They shall no longer dwell in the land of Yhwh, 

Ephraim must go back to Egypt, 

or in Assyria they shall eat unclean things. 

Then they will not be able to pour libations to Yhwh, 

nor to prepare 1 their sacrifices to Him; 

their bread 2 will be like the bread of mourning, 

all that eat thereof will be defiled; 

their bread will serve but to satisfy their hunger, 3 

1 Resid jaarkhil instead oijaeaerbhu. 

2 Read instead of lahaem : lahmam, a reading clearly indicated by 
the second part of the verse. 

3 Cf. Prov. XVI, 26, "The hunger (naephaes) of the toiler drives 
him to toil." 



SPIRITUAL RELIGION 321 

it will not come in the house of Yhwh. 
What will ye do then at the festive season, 
on the day of the feast of Yhwh?" (Hos. IX, 3-5; 
cf. also III, 4, and Ezek. IV, 12L). 

But the most essential feature of this system was 
that religion was primarily the concern of the com- 
munity, not of the individual; the individual, as the 
above-quoted passage from I Sam. XXVI, 19 shows, 
could share in the service of YHWH, and enjoy the 
fellowship of faith only by virtue of being a member of 
the social-religious community. The prime object of 
all religious celebrations and functions was the promo- 
tion of the common weal, not of the individual well- 
being. As W. Robertson Smith well describes it: 
"In ancient religion, as it appears among the Semites, 
the confident assurance of divine help belongs, not 
to each man in his private concerns, but to the com- 
munity in its public functions and aims; and it is 
this assurance that is expressed in public acts of 
worship, where all the membersof the community meet 
together to eat and drink at the table of their god, 
and so renew the sense that he and they are altogether 
at one. . . . The good things which religion holds 
forth are promised to the individual only in so far as he 
lives in and for the community." * With this purpose 
and character of religion it accords that the basis of 
the old Israelitish system of government was the tribal 
or patriarchal order of society — much like the order 
that prevailed in China up to very recent date — and, 
what follows from this, that it was by the principle j 
of tribal solidarity and responsibility that the whole 1 
social-religious life of preexilic Israel was governed. 

1 " The Religion of the Semites," pp. 266L 



322 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

This order of things must be borne in mind if we are 
to realize the full significance of the prophetic concep- 
tion of the relation of the individual to his God. For 
the prophets religion meant individual piety. They re- 
pudiated the idea of tribal responsibility, of mediator- 
ship and sacrifices, and, instead, set up as standard for 
the individual a humble consciousness of God — for He 
is a "present God" — and the moral obligation and 
desire to do what is just and right — for He is a "holy 
God." This conception of religion marks a new era 
in the religious development of Israel, for through it 
religion became dissociated from the confines of 
nation and country; it ceased to be part and parcel 
of the political- social order into which a man was 
born, and became preeminently the concern of the 
individual. 

It should be stated that, while all the prophets 
implicitly opposed the old belief in tribal solidarity 
and collective responsibility, it was Jeremiah in 
particular, who explicitly formulated the new idea of 
moral freedom and individual responsibility : 

"In those days (i. e. in the days of the future Israel) 
it shall no longer be said: 
' The fathers have eaten sour grapes, 
and the teeth of the children are set on edge;' 
but every one will die for his own sin — 
he l that eateth sour grapes, his teeth will be set on 
edge." (Jer. XXXI, 29-30). 

It is not surprising that Jeremiah was the one to 
give expression to this thought, for of him it is more 
true than of any other prophet that his relation to 

1 Omit hoi ha'adam, in accordance with the LXX. 



RIGHTEOUSNESS 323 

God was of a conscious, personal nature. On God he 
relied utterly with heart and reason — from him he 
derived his strength, his comfort, and his hope; and 
his conclusions regarding individual versus collective 
responsibility, as also his picture of the ideal, future 
Israel (which directly follows the verses just quoted), 
are the outgrowth of his own spiritual experience. 1 

3. RIGHTEOUSNESS THE TRUE FOUNDATION OF SOCIETY 

There is still another point on which the views of the 
prophets were diametrically opposed to those of their 
contemporaries, and on which Amos, in especial, is 
most outspoken. This is in regard to the social and 
economic conditions which prevailed throughout the 
land. 

It was the injustice of these conditions and, as we 
have noted above, the undue inflation of the nation 
at large because of the successful issue of the wars of 
Jeroboam II, that fired the soul of Amos to wrath 
and to the belief that retribution must follow. 2 

In those times, even as in our own days, wealth and 
prosperity were looked upon as the bulwark of the 
nation's strength, and as the unmistakable sign of 
God's favor; and, consequently, nothing was so highly 
valued and so diligently sought after as material 
prosperity. 

But Amos had very different views. To him the 

1 What has been remarked at the beginning of this paragraph 
applies particularly to this last point. We must defer to the second 
volume the proof that the departure from the old order of things did 
not start in the juridical sphere, but in the sphere of religion, and 
that it was Jeremiah, and not Ezekiel, who first formulated the 
principle of moral freedom and individual responsibility. 

2 See supra, pp. 2375. 



324 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

country's wealth was offset by the impoverishment of 
the masses, and the ease and luxury to which the 
upper classes complacently gave themselves up were 
purchased by the sweat of the poor: 

"Proclaim in the palaces of Asdod 
and in the palaces of the land of Egypt, 
and bid them assemble in Mt. Samaria, 
and witness the lawlessness and oppression therein. 
They know not how to do right, they 
who let violence and tyranny hold sway in their 
palaces " (Am. Ill, of.). 

The pleasure-loving women of the capital, whom he 
contemptuously calls "Kine of Bashan," 1 vied with 
their husbands in gratifying their avarice and their 
desire for luxurious living: 

"Hear this, ye Kine of Bashan, in Mt. Samaria, 

who oppress the poor and crush the needy, 

who speak to their lords: 

Get [the means] that we may carouse!" (IV, i). 

On account of these conditions, the whole splendid 
structure of which the nation boasts is to Amos a 
tottering edifice, a mighty evil doomed to destruction. 
He represents God speaking: "I loathe the pride of 
Jacob," viz., the splendid palaces of sin, the whole 
flourishing constitution of the state founded on 
despotism, "and I shall deliver up the city and her 
wealth." (VI, 8). 

1 Bashan was noted for its fertile territory and its fine breed of 
cattle. 



RIGHTEOUSNESS 325 

And again he says : 

"Hear this, ye who would swallow up the needy, 

and who ruin the poor of the country, 

who speak, when will the New Moon be gone, 

that we may sell corn? 

and the Sabbath, that we may open the granaries? — 

make the measure small and the price high 

and deal falsely with the balances of deceit ! 1 — 

that we may buy the poor for silver 

and the needy for a pair of shoes, 2 

and that we may sell refuse of grain? 

Yhwh has sworn by the pride of Jacob, 

I will never forget one of their deeds." (VIII, 4-7). 

Again and again Amos tells his audience it is be- 
cause of the orgies indulged in in the palaces of the rich 
and the injustice practised towards the poor that the 
nation must come to ruin. For it is just as impossible, 
he tells them, for a state to exist in which right and 
justice are perverted, as it would be for horses to race 
over rocks, or as it would be to plow the sea with oxen 3 
(VI, 12). 

According to Amos the day of utter woe and terror 
(V, i8fL), when this whole structure of social wrong 
will be destroyed, will be a day of victory for Yhwh — 
but victory in the sense that on that day God's 
justice shall triumph over lawlessness and sin, and 

1 "Make the measure small" etc. — the prophet throws this in as a 
sarcastic reference to their business methods. 

2 "For a pair of shoes," that is to say, "for a trifle." 

3 Instead of jah a ros babb e qarim read, as J. D. Michaelis with fine 
acumen emended, jehares babbaqar jam. babb e qarlm is a plain case 
of false word-division, and this in turn led to the mistaken vocaliza- 
tion jah a ro s. 



326 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

his eternal righteousness be manifest to all the 
world. 

Similarly Isaiah describes his nation's day of doom. 
When all earthly glory sinks in the dust at Yhwh's 
appearance for judgment, men's eyes will be opened 
to the vanity of their idols, to the vanity of all things 
material, and they will realize that the distance 
between the human and the divine is a moral one, 
will realize that God's Kingdom is the Kingdom of 
morality: 

"On that day the Lord Sabaoth will be exalted by 
justice, 

and the Holy God will show Himself holy by right- 
eousness." 1 

This is the ethical monotheism of the prophets, this 
their contribution to religious thought, their message 
to mankind, that it is in man's moral nature that 
religion has its roots, that it is the spiritual, not 
the material world whence the idea of the divine 
flows into man's soul, that it is the sense of right and 
justice innate in man that brings him ever new as- 
surance of the existence of God and of His control of 
the universe for a moral purpose — or, as the prophetic 
author 2 of the story, "Elijah on Mt. Horeb," puts it, 
that it is by "the still, small voice" that God reveals 
Himself to man. 

1 Cf. Is. II, 6-22 +XVII, 7-8, V, 15-16, and see supra, p. 260, n. 2. 

2 See supra, p. 161, n. 1. 



SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE (p. 36) 

On na-tft pro, I Sam. XXI, 9 

Modern as well as mediaeval scholars have been 
divided as to whether to take pK of I Sam. XXI, 9 
as irregular form of pK, if not a misspelled form of 
the same, or as meaning "num?" 1 — a division of 
opinion which may be traced, it seems to me, to the 
rendering, on the one hand, of #"! pN with «^- by the 
Pes., and, on the other hand, of pK with si and ^N by 
Jerome and the Targ. respectively. However, on 
closer examination, the rendering of K\\pN> with 'ISe el 
€<ttiv by the LXX points in the direction indicated 
above, p. 36. It must be pointed out (1) that like the 
Pes., Jerome, and the Targ., the LXX did not read the 
1 of pro; (2) that the question, though not indicated 
in the Hebrew text by any interrogative particle, was 
introduced by the Greek translators with el — there are 
two other such cases in the following Chap. XXII; 
v. 7 gam rkhulkhaem jitten baenjisai =el akqdw iraaiv 
v/iilv Scbaei 6 vlbs 'Ieo-cm, and v. 15, hajjom hahillothi 
UVol-lo bheldhlm =ij arjixepov rjpjfJLac ipcorav avrcp 81a rov 
0eoO.2 Hence from the t8e el of the LXX one cannot 

1 K6nig in his article, " Syntactische Excurse zum Alt. Test." 
(in ZATW, XVIII, 239s.) discusses these two views at length, as also 
Klostermann's emendation of w e 'in to w^e (in "Die Biicher 
Samuelis und der Konige," 1887, ad loc.) and Wellhausen's emenda- 
tion to r e 'e h a (in " Der Text der Biicher Samuelis," 1871, ad loc.) 

2 These examples show that Konig is far afield in suggesting that 
"Auf die Voraussetzung eines solchen Hn (viz. = UK) kann das 
€t in t8c et corn/ der LXX . . . hinweisen" (ib., 243). 

327 



328 THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

conclude, as Wellhausen did, and following him 
Budde x and Kittel 2 — the latter reservedly — that the 
original text read "fe^n nan, but rather that the LXX 
took pK as equivalent to run. 3 

No doubt this rendering by the LXX was based on a 
reliable tradition; at all events it is the only satisfac- 
tory explanation of this much debated text. Modern 
scholars have clearly been at sea regarding this TK. 
Thus Budde in Die Biicher Samuel (in Marti's 
HC.) abandons Wellhausen 's emendation r e, e h a in 
favor of Klostermann's w e, e — no doubt because of 
the difficulty of explaining how r* l e h a could have got 
changed to w e, in. There are, however, even graver 
obstacles in the way of accepting Klostermann's 
emendation; for apart from the fact that w e 'ejaes-po 
thahath jad e kha is stylistically objectionable, nsntu 

x See "The Books of Samuel" in The Sacred Books of the Old 
Test., ad loc. 

2 See "Biblia Hebraica," ad loc, where the readings w e 'en and 
r e 'e h a jaes are proposed as alternatives. 

3 Hinne is rendered with i'Se I. Sam. XX, 22 hinne hakesi(m), 
"iSe (A) 7} <rx% a further Gen. XXVII, 6 hinne samati T8e iyot 
r/Kovaa, and Jud. XIX, 24 hinne bitti, t'Se (l$ov A) 17 Ovydrrjp fiov. 
An example, on the other hand, of hinne introducing a question 
spoken with emphasis, is I. Sam. XIV, 43, hin e nl 'amuth, "must I 
die? " So Kittel, in Kautzsch 3 , rightly translates it. The fact that 
Saul in reply to Jonathan's confession again declares (cf. v. 39) by an 
oath, that Jonathan must die (v. 44), admits of no other interpreta- 
tion. This declaration would have no sense if Jonathan had just ex- 
pressed his readiness to die. In Arabic oj (both without and with 
the interrogative f ) occurs quite frequently in interrogative sentences. 
When used to introduce a complete sentence the emphatic particle 
commonly adds emphasis to the sentence as a whole, i. e., to the 
predicate rather than to the subject. Accordingly it occurs not only 
with the indicative but with the various other modes as well. An 
example of its use with an imperative is hen habbaet-na, Is„ 
LXIV, 8. 



SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE 329 

nowhere occurs separated by an intervening word. 
Kittel in Kautzsch 3 , on the other hand, decides for the 
reading w e, en (in the first edition he accepted Wellhau- 
sen's emendation unreservedly), but since en jel 
expresses an emphatic negation 1 its use in an inter- 
rogative sentence is excluded, and 'aph 'en jaes-ru a h 
tfphthaeni, Ps. CXXXV, 17, which has been referred 
to in support of this emendation, proves nothing, as 
it is a declarative sentence. 

There is really no reason why the occurrence of such 
an emphatic pK in Hebrew should excite surprise. 
Like Aram. p«, «£, and, contrary to the general 
view, also d of Aram, p, it is another form of 
fn which latter, in accordance with a suggestion 
made by Reckendorf with reference to the relation of 
Arab. ^ to o/, 2 is not to be considered as the 
younger, apocopate, but rather as the older, non- 
sharpened form of nzn. And what Fleischer and 
Reckendorf state in reference to the conditional 
particle oj and J/, o/, "ecce" viz., that they 
are identical, being originally deictic particle out of 
which the use as conditional particle subsequently de- 
veloped, 3 holds true of their Hebrew and Aramaic 
equivalents: these may be used either as deictic or 

1 It must be borne in mind that 6^J ftf cannot be considered as 
equivalent to Aram, c^- and Arab. J$ ; as a matter of fact, in 
Hebrew PK is used as equivalent to the latter, and t^ tfb, the corre- 
sponding Hebrew form of i>^ and w does not in all probability occur 
at all, for in the case of Job. IX, 33 & $f? (c/. II. Sam. XVIII, 12) 
is the better attested reading. : 

2 See, "Die Syntactischen Verhaltnisse des Arabischen," 354f., 
Anm. 1. 

3 See Fleischer, "Kleinere Schriften," I, 122, 421, also 1131!.; 
Reckendorf, op ciL, 353f., 745, Anm. 1; see also Caspari- Wright, " A 
Grammar of the Arabic Language," II, 16, Rem. a. 



33 o THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL 

affirmative particle, or as conditional particle. Con- 
clusive proof of this I find in the fact that also 
Hebrew DX — with deflection of the primary | to D — ■ 
is both conditional and emphatic particle. 1 

4 For the complete proof of the above assertion there is no place in 
the present work. It will be published separately. 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES DIS- 
CUSSED OR INTERPRETED 

The order of the Biblical Books in this Index is that of the 
Hebrew Bible 



GENESIS 

PAGE 

I, 16 40, n. i 

XX, 2 307L, n. 

XXVII, 6 328, n. 3 

XL, 14 199, n. 1 

XLII, 28 42, n. 2 

EXODUS 

XI, 4 217, n. 

XII, 12 217, n. 

— 23 217, n. 

XXIII, 6 215, n. 1 

XXXII, 24 51 

— 29 107, n. 

XXXIII, s 2i 7 ,n. 

LEVITICUS 

XXIV, 14, 16 28 

NUMBERS 

XV,35f 28 

XVI, 18 40, n. 1 

XXII, 6 97 

XXIII, 9 4 

XXXI, 7 282 

331 



DEUTERONOMY 

PAGE 

IV, 6 308, n. 

VIII, 3 108, n. 

XIII, 1 32 

— 2-6 34 

— 3,4 30 

— 10 28 

XIV, 24 35, n. 1 

XVII, 7 28 

— 8-12 34 

— 16 246, n. 1 

XVIII, 15-22 2gff., 41, 44 

XXIII, 15 217, n. 

XXVII, 19 215, n. 1 

XXVIII, 43 252 

— 64 320 

XXIX, 3 155, n. 1 

XXXIII 239 

— 9 f 34 

JOSHUA 
XXII, 31 118, n. 1 

JUDGES 

V, 23 306 

XIX, 24 328, n. 3 



332 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



I SAMUEL 

PAGE 

DC, 6, 20 143, n. 1 

X, 5L, ioff 143, n. 1 

XIV, 41 317, n. 1 

— 43 328, n. 3 

XV, 31 no 

XIX, 20-24 143, n. 1 

XX, 22 328, n. 3 

XXI, 9 36, 327ff- 

XXII, 7, 15 327 

XXIII, 19 41 

XXV, 8 288 

— 13 IIQ 

XXVI, 1 41 

— 19 320L 

XXIX, 8 35, n. 1 

II SAMUEL 

HI, 35 97 

V, 6-10 229 

VI, 1 193 

VII, 5 231, n. 2 

XII, 28 99, n. 1 

XVIII, 12 329, n. 1 

XIX, 14 97 

XX, 19 192 

XXIV 228, n. 2 

I KINGS 

1,37 214, n. 4 

V,i si 

VIII, 27 i 4 6f. 

X, 28 246, n. 1 

XII, 21 193 

XIX 161, n. 1, 326 

— 4 98 

XXII, 6ff 148 



II KINGS 

PAGE 

HI, 15 143, n. 1 

— 24 288 

XII, 19 238 

XIII, 7 238 

— 14-19 238,306 

XIV, 9-14 238 

— 25-27 238L 

XVI, 3 f 227, n. 

XVII, 24-28 308L 

— 24-32 229 

— 29-41 308, n. 1 

XVIII, 4 297, n. 

XIX-XX 295 

XIX, 5-7 292 

XXIII, 6f 227, n. 

— 15 229 

XXIV, 1, 7 45, n. 1 

ISAIAH 

I, 2-20 206, n. 2 

— 3 236 

— 10 13, n. 

— 10-18 296 

— 10-20 312L 

— n-17 32 

— 31 214, n. 3 

II, 6-22 . . 256, 260, 264, n. 1, 326 

— 6 236 

HI, 13 49, n- 1 

IV, 1 99, n. 1 

V, 15-16 . 260, 326 

— 16 269 

— 19 153,286 

— 26 49, n. 1 

V, 26-30 257, 26iff. 

VI 139, 142, 161, 

n. 2, 163, 2555. 

— 3-8 270 

— 13 258, 260 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



333 



PAGE 

VII, 3-14, 16-21, 23-25 265 

— 4 269,293 

— 4ff 76 

— 9 269, 293, 294L, n. 

— 15 and 22 265, n. 1 

VII, 14-VIII, 8 152 

VIII, if 173, 266, n. 2 

— 1-8, 11-18 265 

— 3 142 

— 9-10 265, n. 2 

— n 101 

— i2f 269 

— 14 231 

— 16-18. . . .169, 173, 294, 11. 2 

— 17 236 

IX, 1-6 270 

IX, 7-X, 4 256ft., 26iff. 

— 20 252 

X, 5-34 259,293 

X, 5-19 272, 273f., 285s. 

— 18 120, n. 2 

20 259, 272ft. 

— 21-23 2595., 273 

— 24-27 259, 272ff. 

— 27C-34 273,275 

XIV, 4 ff 58 

— 24-27 2726:., 293 

— 28-32 273, 276ft., 293 

XVII, S i 2 57 f. 

— 7f 260, 326 

XVII, 12-XVIII, 6... 273, 

278ff., 293 

XIX, 23ft 273, n. 1 

XX, 2 f 142 

XXI, 1-10 288 

XXII, 1-14 287s. 

— 6 288, 290, n. 1 

XXIV, 10 182, n. 2, 276 

XXVIII, 1-4, 7-22 265L 

■— 1»3 287, n. 1 



PAGE 

XXVIII, 2 100, n. 1 

— 9* 29 

— 16 294, n. 2 

— 16, 17 269L 

— 19 ii3f., 308,11. 

XXIX, 1-4, 5C-6, 9-14 
206, n. 2, 265J:., 28of., 282, 

293L 

— 5 a-b, 7-8 273, 278, 

28off., 293 

— 9-14 296 

11-12 267 

— 13-14 3IO 

— 17-24 283, n. 1 

XXX, 1-17 76, 266 

— 1 245 

— 1-7, 16 282 

— 8 169,173 

— 8-11 2 66f. 

— 9-12 296 

— iof 29 

— 1 5 153 

— 15* 269, 284, 293 

— 16 245 

— 18-33 283 

XXXI, 1-4 266, 282L 

— 1 245 

XXXI, 5-9 ..273, 278, 282, 

2832., 291, 293 

— 6 236 

XXXII, 3 155, n. 1 

XXXVII-XXXIX 295 

XXXVII, 2ff 78 

— 5-7 292 

— 22ff 58 

— 31 228, n. 1 

XL, 1-8 154 

— 4 106, n. 2 

— 13 118, n. 1 

XLII, 7, i8f 155, n. I 



334 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



PAGE 

XLII, 13 217, n. 

XLIII,8 155 

XLV, 8 156 

— 20 252 

XLVI, 13 51 

XLVII, 12 204 

XLVIII, 14 252 

LVII, is 318 

LXIII, 7 199, n. 1 

LXIV, 8 328, n. 3 

JEREMIAH 

I, 1-10, 15-19 139, 142 

— 5 US 

— 8, 17-19 10 

— 11 39 

— 11-14 142 

— 18 102 

II, 4, 14, 26, 31 236 

— 11 103, n. 4, 189, n. 1 

III, 6-IV, 2 195, n. 1 

III, 17, IV, 2 104 

IV, 3-31 179, i95ff- 

— 3f 206, n. 2 

— 7 120, n. 2 

— 10 190 

— 14 214, n. 3 

— 19-21 16L 

— 31 i94 

V, 12-14, 31 19° 

— 21 155, n. 1 

VI 203 

— 11 100, n. 2 

VII, 1-15, 21-26 1 iff., 

2iff., 32, 35 

— I6-20, 27- VIII, 3 2lff. 

— 28 35, n. 1 

VIII, 4 22 

-8 35 



PAGE 

VIII, 16, 18, IX, 1 i6f. 

IX, 22-23 15*-, i©3ff. 

— 23 145, n- 2 

X, 23-24 103s. 

XI, 18-XII, 3 a, 5-6..8iff., 

84ff., 89L, 115S. 
XI, 2off., XII, 3b 112 

XI, 21 29 

XII, i~3a 17L, 109 

— 3b, 4....n 5 ff., i87ff., i8 9 f. 

— 6 14 

— 12 49, n. 

XIII, iff 142 

XIII, 15-27 ...i79ff., 191 

— 20-27 191 

XIV, i-XV, 9 179, i8 4 ff. 

XIV, 1-9 116 

— 17 276 

— 18 i6f., 113L 

XV, 10, 15-21 i4,44f-, 

81L, 89, 95ff., no 

— 12-14 • • -95f- 

— 15 112 

— 16 17 

— i7f i6f. 

XVI, 1-9 i6f., 102 

— 10-18, 20-21 103 

XVI, 19 i9f., io3ff. 

XVII, 1-4 96 

XVII, 5-10, 14-18... 15*., 

igf., 8if., 8gf., io3ff. 
— -11-13 103, n. 2 

— 15 153 

XVII, 19-27 32, 4gff. 

XVIII, 1-12... 208ff. 

-18 35 

XVIII, 18-20 8if., 86 

— 20 112 

— 21-23 112 

XIX 86f. 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



33S 



PAGE 

XIX, i, 2, 3a 22, n. I 

XX, 1-6 86f. 

— 1-3 16 

XX, 7-11, 13 8iff., 87, 

89f., i2ifL, 129, n. 

— 7-9 9, 100, n. 1, no 

— 9 149 

— 10 14,86 

— na 17 

— 12 126 

XX, 14-18. .8if., 89, 112, 127ft. 
XXI 55,66 

— 1-3 66f., 68f. 

— ia 76 

— 4-14 . . 54L, 6off., 6qL, 72ff., 84 

— 12 214, n. 3, 2S4L 

XXII, i 5 f 145, n. 2 

— 18 74 

XXIII, 9-40 144ft., T-5S 

• — 16-22 31 

— 23 318 

XXV 38, 46ff., 207 

— 31 208, n. 1 

XXVI 22L, 2 4 ff., 34 ff., 70 

— 4-5 13, n. 

XXVII 6i,n.,78f.,n. 3 

— iff 142 

XXVIII 78L, n. 3 

— i-ii 31, n. 1 

— 8, 9, 12-16 3of. 

XXIX, 26 57, 87 

XXX, 2 f 169, 173 

XXXI, 7 219 

— 8 49, n. 

— 29-30 322f. 

— 31-34.. 1311., 23L, 3i8f., 323 

XXXII, 1-1 5 19, 71, 173 

— 3b~5 55, 6off., 7iff., 76 

— 10 134 

— i6ff., 19 109, n. 1 



PAGE 

XXXIV, 1-3.... 55, 6off., 7 off. 

— 4-6 74 

— 7 74, 76 

XXXIV, 8-22 52f., 55 , 

65, 76f. 
XXXV 44L 

— 1, 11 45 

XXXVI 15, 3 8ff., 4 6f., 167 

— 2 39, 144, 

168 

— 3, 7 204f. 

— 27-32 167L, 173 

— 28, 29 134 

— 32 133 

XXXVII, if 77L 

— 3,7a 65L, 67L 

— 4 77 

— 5 77 

— 7b-io 53, 76f. 

— n-16 16, n. 1, 65 

— 11-21 53, 7i 

XXXVII, 17-21 55L, 62ff. 

— 19 53*-, n- 

— 21 77 

XXXVIII, 1-13 5 3 ff., 6 9 ff. 

— 1-4 68 

— 1-6 27 

— 9 145, n- 1 

XXXVIII, 14-27 55ff. 

XXXIX, 17 86 

XLV 207L 

— 5 49, n- 

XLVI-LI 46,11. 

XLVI, 2-12 4 6f.,n. 

XLVIII, 4, 17 276 

XLIX, 19 120, n. 2 

L-LI 79, n., 288, n. 1 

L, 44 120, n. 2 

LI, 8 205 

LI, 59-64 79, n. 



33^ 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



EZEKIEL 

PAGE 

I I6 3 

Iff 163 

III, 14 100, n. 1 

IV, 12 321 

V, 15, 17 74, n. 1 

VII, 26f 113 

VHIff 163 

XII, 2 155, n. 

— 22 35, n. 1 

XXI, 22, 37 74, n. 1 

XXIII, 34 74, n. 1 

XXVI, 5, 14 74, n. 1 

XXVIII, 10 74, n. 1 

XXX, 12 74, n. 1 

XXXIV, 24 74, n. 1 

XXXVII, n.... 35, n. 1,114, n. 
XL-XLVIII 32 



HOSEA 

I-III 237, 24off., 251L 

I, 3 253 

— 4f 125 

— 4, 6, 9 142 

II, 1-3 25iff. 

— 4f 240 

— 9 240L, 243 

— 16-25 240L, 242, 

243, 244, 250 

— 2lf 250, 318 

III 24I 

— 4 321 

~4-S 25iff. 

IV, if 249 

— 8, 12 317 

— 17 246 

V, i-isa 247L 

— 4 249 



PAGE 

V,4~6 317 

— 6 206 

— 13 246 

— 14 186, n. 1 

V, 1 5b- VI, 3 240L, 2475. 

VI, 3 318 

— 4ff 250 

— 6 3 2 ,3 I o 

VII, 11 151L, 245 

— nff 246 

— 14 316 

VIII, 4 245, n. 1 

— 4ff .... 246 

— 8 210 

— 9 246 

— 11 316 

— n-13 32 

— 13 152,245 

IX, 3-5 152, 32of. 

— 3, 6 245 

— 7f 29 

— 10 235L 

X, 1 316 

— 3*-, 5* 246 

— i2f 240, n. 1 

— 13' 245, n. 1,246 

XI, if 237* 

— 2 246 

— 5 152,245 

— 7-11 240, n. 2 

XII, 2 246 

XIII, 2 246 

XIV, 2-9 240, 244.fi . 

— 10 244, n. 1 



JOEL 

III, 1 49, n. 

IV, 16 227ff. 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 337 

AMOS PAGE 

PAGE VI, II 23of., 234, 236 

I-VI 224,235 —12 325 

I i2f., n. —13 234,239 

I-II 307f. — 14 234, n. 

I, 2 2Ilf., 227fL, 235, 305 VII, I-9 222ff. 

II, 4f 23iff. — 1-6 142, n. 1 

— 6 215, n. 1 —7-9 139, 233 

— 9 228, n. 1 — 9 233L 

— 6-16 232L — 10-17 222 

III,i-8 232 —12-17 8 

— 1 230 — i4f 143, 230 

— 2 230, 232L, n. 2, 307L — 15 233f. 

— 8 8 VIII, 1-2, 3, 10, 13-14 224L 

— 8, 9 222 — 1-2 142, 222, 233 

III, 9-IV, 3 232,234 — 4-8a 222, 232 

— 9* 324 ~4 107,11.3 

— 9^13 i2f., n. —4-7 3 2 S 

— 12 258 — 11-12 ii3f., 224, n. 2, 303 

IV, 1 324 — i3f 235, 236 

IV, 4-V, 27 235,236 —14 230 

IV, 4-12 206, 235 IX, 1-4. . . .142, 212, 224L, 

— 4-ii 223 235, 293 

— 4 230 — 7 233, 3o6f., 30811. 

— 4f 311 IX, 8b-i5 212, n. 

V, 1-17 2i2ff., 235 —12 99, n. 

— 1-2 ^o4f . 

„ c V,o MICAH 

— 4, 5 230 

— 6 234 I-III 297 

— 14-15 3 12 IV-VII 297 

— 15b 234, 239 I,io-i6 275 

V, 18-27 235 III, 1, 8f., 10 236 

— i8ff 325 — 5-8 143*. 

— 18 230 — 6f 113L 

— 21-25 3 2 — 9-11 i86f. 

— 21-24 3 11 *- V, 6-7 219 

VI 234 VI, 6-8 32, 3iof., 3i7f., 322 



— 1-6 219 

— ! 230,234 

— 6 234, 239 1,2-n 7 



HAGGAI 
-8 236,324 11,3-5,11-14 7 



33& 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 



ZACHARIAH 

PAGE 

I, 7~VI,8 163 

I,i2 7 

II,i3,i5,III,2 7 

IV, 6-10 7 

— 6 3,7 

VI, 15 7 

VIII, 3-9, 10, 13, 19 7 

X, iof 273, n. 1 

XIV, 12 282 

PSALMS 

VI, $1 123, n. 2 

VII, 4-6 97, n. 

XV, 4 186, n. 1 

XXXI, 11 125, n. 2 

XXXV, 9 f 123, n. 2 

— IS 14, n. 4 

XXXVIII, 18 14, n. 4 

XLIV, 10 217, n. 

LI 315 

LX, 12 217, n. 

LXXI, 20 118, n. 1 

LXXIII, 23 120 

— 28 147 

LXXVII, 12 199, n. 1 

LXXXIII, 9 273, n. 1 

LXXXV, 12 156 

CIV, 21 107, n. 3 

CXXVI, 2 2i4f., n. 4 

CXXX 315 

CXXXV, 17 329 

CXXXVII,8 202, n. 2 

PROVERBS 

I, 19 188 

III, 12 243 

— 21 51 



PAGE 

V, 18 no, n. 2 

IX, 1 104, n. 1 

XXIV, 24 199, n. 1 

XXV, 23 100, n. 2 

JOB 

III, 20 181, n, 

IV, 12-16 140 

VI, 15-20 100, n. 3 

VII, 17 no 

VIII, 13 188 

— 18 181, n. 1 

IX, 33 329, n. 1 

X, 20 no 

XV, 8 no 

XVII, 6 199, n. 1 

XVIII, 12 14, n. 4 

XIX, 29 284, n. 

XXXI 97, n. 

XXXVII, 4 212, n. 

LAMENTATIONS 
111,35 215, n. 1 

ECCLESIASTES 
VIII, 11 144, n- 

ESTHER 

VII, 5 i44 ; n. 

DANIEL 

VIII, 8 276 

XI, 8 252 



INDEX OF SCRIPTURE PASSAGES 339 

EZRA JESUS BEN SIRACH 

PAGE PAGE 

VI, 22 273, n. i VIII, 10 214,11.3 

XX, 6 106, n. 2 



NEHEMIAH 

IV, 4 125, n. 2 

XIII, 15-22 4Qff. 



I CHRONICLES 

XII, 1 41 

XVII, 4 231,11. 2 

XIX, 10 193 

XXI-XXII, 1 228, n.2 



MATTHEW 

VII, 7f 249 

XXIV, 1 11, n. 2 



MARK 
XIII, 1 11, n. 2 



II CHRONICLES THE ACTS 

I, 16 246, n. 1 n , 4 149, n. 

VI, 18 i46f. x, 46 149, n. 

XX, 4 252 xiX, 6 149, n. 

XXVIII, 15 125, n. 2 

— 17, 18 262L 

— 18 2 76 I CORINTHIANS 

XXXII, 4 252 

— 2-5, 30 290 XIV, 2, 4, 13L, 18, 27 . . 149, n. 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



Ahaz, 269, 276 
Ahikam, 28, 37!:., 40 
Alexander, victory at Issos of, 

277; figurative description of, 

277L 
Amaziah, priest of Beth-El, 8, 

143 

Amenophis IV, religious refor- 
mation of, 158L, n. 

Amos: 
inaugurates literary or spirit- 
ual prophecy, 5, 155, 175; 
his home-village and -state, 5, 
8, 302; place of his preaching, 
8, 223, 234, 237, 304; season 
of the year, 172, n. 2, 304; ex- 
pelled from the country, 8, 
29; his writings, contrasted 
with Jeremiah's, 211; domi- 
nant note of, 2 1 if.; style, 2 2 if.; 
relation of, to oral preach- 
ing, 221, 224; original order, 
structure, and theme of V, 1- 
17, 2132.; text-disturbances, 
extent and origin of, 222; vi- 
sions, so-called, VII, 1-6, pur- 
port of, 223L; relation to IV, 
6-1 1, 223f.; vision, the, VII, 
7-9, 222fi\, cf. 139; visions, the, 

VIII, 1-2, IX, 1-4, 223, 224f., 

cf. 142; social and religious 
conditions in both kingdoms, 
subject of his preaching, 2253., 
cf. 2i8f., 223; authenticity of 



I, 2, 227ff.; origin of 2a, 228; 
popular notion associated with, 
229; his paradoxical applica- 
tion of, 229f.; other examples 
of the kind, 230, cf. 218; de- 
nounces superiority of Zion 
even as sanctity of other 
YHWH-sanctuaries, 229L, 
23sf.; "Israel," etc., "Jacob," 
etc., usage of terms in Amos, 
232L, 236; "House of Isaac," 
"High-places of Isaac," mean- 
ing of, 233L; incentive to his 
preaching, 234, 2381., 304; his 
view of Jeroboam II's vic- 
tories, 23&f.,323;$e'erith Joseph, 
meaning of, 219, 239; inter- 
polations: II, 4f., 23 iff.; DC, 
8D-15, 212, n. 1; his person- 
ality, contrasted with Jere- 
miah's, 302L; misjudged by 
critics, 211, 303f.; his God- 
conception vs. that of his 
times, 305s.; denies Israel's 
monopoly of YHWH'S favor, 
306, 3o8n.; his interpretation 
of Israel's deliverance from 
Egypt, 307f.; his view of 
worship, the religious advance 
marked by, 2i8f., 223, 226, 
3o8f., 311, 3132.; his view- 
point regarding material pros- 
perity, 3232.; see Inspiration 
Asdod, conquest of, 89, 295, n. 3 



34i 



342 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



Assur, meaning of name, in post- 
exilic literature, 273, n. 1 
Astarte (Ashera) worship, 273, n. 

Baruch, 15, 38ff., 172, 207f. 
Beth-El, after destruction of 

Samaria, 222 
"Blessing of Moses" (Deut. 

XXXIII), 238L 

Centralization of the cult, 35, 229 

Chaldaeans, withdrawal of, from 

Jerusalem, 52; return of, 53L, 

63 
Children, sacrificing of, 227, n. 
Civil war, the, 89, 262, 264 
Communion (converse) with God, 

see Inspiration 
Criminal court, 24 
Curse, belief in efficacy of, 96L 

David, 3f . ; conquest of the Jebu- 
site stronghold by, 228 

Deutero-Isaiah, 6f., 9, 174, 243; 
see Inspiration 

Deuteronomic law pertaining to 
false prophet, 295. 

Deuteronomic Law, promulga- 
tion of, 23, 35 

Discrepancy, seeming, between 
Jer. XXXVI, 1 and v. 9, 40, 

n. 3 

Divination, forms of, i38f., 148L; 
practised by the older proph- 
ets, 143 

Divine call, see Inspiration 

Downfall of the nation, effect of, 
on the people, ii3f., 303 

Dur-ilu, battle at, 277 

Ebed-Melech, 54, 86 

Edom, attack of, on Judah, 262f. 



Egypt, trade in horses by, 245L 

Elijah, 160 

Elisha, 143, n.; his concern at the 

nation's defeat by Syria, 238, 

306 
"Ends of the earth," from the, 

49, n., 265 
Era, autumnal, vernal, 40, n. 3 
Ethical Monotheism, 326 
Ezekiel, 32, i62f., 174 

Fatalism, sidereal, of antiquity, 

"Guilt of Samaria," the, 230 

Hananiah, denounced by Jere- 
miah, 30L 

Hezekiah, 290, 295, 297, n. 

Hosea: 

subject of the Northern King- 
dom, 237; his preaching ad- 
dressed to whole nation, 236f., 
cf. 226L, n.; "Israel," "Beth- 
Israel," etc., his usage of the 
terms, 236; his future hope, 
various expositions of, gen- 
uine, 240L, 243, 246L, 247L, 
250; outcome of his God- 
conception, 241L, 247; experi- 
ence in his life that led to the 
latter, 80, 24if.; figure of the 
marital relationship, 247; Love 
and Law not antitheses, 242L; 
the two-fold aspect from which 
he considers the future resto- 
ration, 244, 250; "ride on 
horses," origin of phrase, 245L; 
the spiritual truth revealed in 
VI, 3, 249, 25of.; knowledge of 
God, 249L, 318; original order 
of I-III, 251; original place 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



343 



of II, 1-3, 25iff.; "Great shall 
be the day of Jezreel," 253; 
influence on Isaiah, 245; his 
view of worship, 310, 3152., 
cf. 249L; his idea of prayer, 
316; see Inspiration 

Immanence of God, see Inspira- 
tion and Jeremiah 

Inspiration, prophetic: 

distinct from ecstasy or man- 
tic possession, 1361!., 143, 151, 
161L, n. 2; consecration- vi- 
sions, spiritual experience de- 
scribed in, 139; revelation and 
attendant emotions, account 
of, in Is. VI and Job IV, 1 2-16, 
I3gf.; modern analogies, i4off.; 
other visions, psychological 
explanation of, 142; inspira- 
tion and revelation as under- 
stood by the great prophets, 
143s.; by Amos, 143, cf. 8; by 
Micah, i43f.; by Jeremiah, 
I44n\; true prophet, mark of, 
145; converse with God, me- 
dium of, i45f.; immanence of 
God, i46f.; true revelation, 
evidences and workings of, 
contrasted with mistaken no- 
tion of, i48ff., cf. 9; the revela- 
tion of God universal, isof., 
cf. i2f., n.; inspired prophecy 
vs. vaticination, 15 iff.; es- 
sence of, 1525., cf. 3of.; Deu- 
tero-Isaiah's conception of in- 
spiration and revelation, i54f.; 
conception of inspiration the 
governing principle of spiritual 
prophecy, 155, i6of.; the re- 
ligious advance marked there- 



by, i55f-> 322f.; genius, 156L; 
religious views prior to liter- 
ary prophecy, in Israel, i57f.; 
among the Oriental nations, 
i58f.; conditions in the ancient 
world at the time of the proph- 
ets' preaching, 159L; story of 
Elijah on Mt. Horeb (I Ki. 
XIX), growth and composi- 
tion of, 161, n. 1; Ezekiel's 
idea of revelation, 162; his 
writings and visions, character 
of, 163; Zachariah's writings 
and visions, character of, 163 
Isaiah : 

compared with Jeremiah, 9; 
events marking the various 
periods of his preaching, 89; 
the consecration-vision, 139, 
161, n. 2, 163; not colored by 
his later experience, 256L; 
starts out with a clear vision 
of the situation, 255^; the 
destruction is to be complete, 
25 7f.; the idea expressed by 
the comparison in VI, 13, 
257f.; the hope expressed by 
his son's name, Sh e 'ar Yashubk, 
258L; the prophecy explaining 
the name, 2595.; "Ya'akob," 
usage of term, in his older 
prophecies, 260, 261; his de- 
scription of the Day of YHWH 
(II, 6-22), component parts of, 
260, n. 2; the idea developed 
in, 260, 263, 264, n. 1, 326; the 
prophecy, IX, 7ff., addressed 
to Israel and Judah alike, 
26of.; conditions and reverses 
described in, 26 2f.; the idea de- 
veloped in, 263s.; his view of 



344 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



the situation unchanged in 
the following periods, 26sff.; 
exerts no influence on the peo- 
ple or state, 266L; no states- 
man, 268f.; his basic views — 
faith and holiness, 2692., 291, 
293, 294f., n., 296, cf. 263, 
322; his idea of progress, 270; 
no discrepancy in his prophe- 
cies, 272ff.; his attitude in the 
crisis of the year 701, 282s., 
287, 292; his view of the As- 
syrian world-power, 2856"., cf. 
271; denounces the belief in 
the inviolable sanctity of Zion, 
28of., 293L; stood aloof from 
political life to the end, 291, 
292f., 294ff.; "Vale of Vision," 
the, (XXII, 5), explanation of, 
289L; his view of worship, 
293L, 296, 310, 3111., 316, 322; 
see Inspiration, and Prophetic 
messages, preservation of 
"Israel," "Beth-Israel," usage 
of terms in Hexateuch and 
historic literature, 236; after 
the destruction of Samaria, 236 

"Jacob," "Beth Yaakob," us- 
age of terms, after destruction 
of Samaria, 236 

Jehoachaz, defeat of, by Syria, 
2 3 8f. 

Jehojada, priest, 87 

Jehojakim, attitude of to Jere- 
miah, 4if., 43f.; recognition of 
Nebuchadrezzar's suzerainty 
by, 45, n. 

Jehojachin, 61, n., 87, 179 

Jeremiah: 
greatest exponent of the faith 



of the prophets, gi., 15L, 17!!., 
124, i68f.; the Temple-sermon, 
the beliefs denounced in, the 
positive views expressed in, 
1 iff., 23, 35, 3091.; critical 
analysis of, 2 iff.; persecution 
resulting from, 13L, 21, 43ff., 
84L, 96L; condemned to death, 
24ff., 85; helped into hiding 
by Ahikam, 37ff.; writing 
down of his prophecies, read- 
ing of by Baruch, 15, 38f.; 
occasion of, reason for, 15, 
4of., 46ff., 172, 207; scroll 
burned by Jehojakim, 15; 
motive of king's action, 4iff.; 
attitude of Micajah b. Gemar- 
jah to reading, 38, n.; of the 
SariniyS&j n.,4iff.; date of, 40; 
flogged by Pashhur, 16, n., 
86f.; persecution renewed, 14, 
52ff., 84, 8sf., ii7f-; flogged 
and imprisoned in a dungeon 
by the Sarim, 16, 53; prophecy 
that provoked them, 52L, 65f., 
76f., summoned by Zedekiah 
for interview, 53f., 62ff.; com- 
mutation of sentence, 53, 64; 
thrown into a miry cistern, 27, 
54; rescued by Ebed-Melech, 
54f., 86; the utterance which 
gave offence, 53L, 6of., 62, 66, 
68, 695., 84, 284f.; authen- 
ticity of wrongly questioned, 
75; legendary accounts of 
Jeremiah, 56ff., 67s.; origin of, 
62, 78; unhistoric conception 
of Jeremiah due to, 78f., cf. 
61; his mental suffering, i6f., 
58, 99ff., inf., i8of., 191, 195, 
1991.; conflict of feelings, 202f.; 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



345 



prayed for suspension of the 
doom, 112; effect of persecu- 
tion on his inner life, 17, 8of., 
90, 99; his confessions, record 
of his spiritual experience, 9, 
10, isf., i7f., 19, 21, 45, 81, 

89, 90, 99ff., ii4f., 117, 119, 
i22f., 124, 126, 133; date of, 
9, n. 1, 14, 15, 19, 44f., 8iff., 

90, 97, 104, 123, 126, 128; 
present order of, 81, 86f., 
I28f.; literary character of, 
90; his view of worship, nff., 
309L, 316, 318, 322; divine 
authority of the moral law, 
i2f., n. 3, 23; immanence of 
God, i46f., 318; absolute de- 
pendence of man on God, 109, 
114; problem of suffering, his 
solution of, ii9f., 121; retri- 
bution, spiritual, 109; moral 
freedom and individual re- 
sponsibility, 322f.; his future 
hope, 13, n., i9f., i03f., 115, 
3i8f., 323; date of purchase of 
property from Hanamel, 71; 
nothing eschatological about 
Jer. IV, 23s., 201; authorship 
of the oracles against the na- 
tions, 46f., n., 79, n., 208, n. 1; 
see Inspiration, and Prophetic 
Messages, preservation of 

Jeroboam II, victories of, 
2 3 8f. 

Jerusalem and its Temple, in- 
violable sanctity of, see Zion- 
Jerusalem 

Joash, implores Elisha's blessing, 
238 

Judah, alliance of with Egypt, 
89, 169, 266, 269 



Karkemish, battle at, 15, 45, n. 
Kingdom of God, 6, I9f., 154, 
260, 326, cf. 156 

"Lebanon," the, descriptive use 
of, 275 

Messianic hope, characteristic 
features of, in postexilic times, 
271, 274 

Micah, 35, 113, i86f.; his view of 
the doom, 297; his view of 
worship, the religious advance 
marked by, 3iof., 3i7f., 322; 
see Inspiration 

Micajah b. Jimlah, 160 

Nathan, 160 

Nebuchadrezzar, first appear- 
ance in Judah, 45 

Oath, see Curse 
Ophael (Acropolis), 73, n. 
Oracle, method of consulting, 
3i7, n. 1 

Pashhur, 16, n. 86f. 

Penitential Psalms, Biblical, con- 
trasted with Babylonian, 315 

Pharao Necho, song of derision 
at defeat of, 47, n. 

Philistines, attack of, on Judah, 
263, 276 

Philo, view of revelation of, 138, 
153, 162 

Plato, view of revelation of, 138, 
153, 156, 162 

Prophetic messages, preserva- 
tion of, due to prophets' own 
initiative, i67f., 169; motive 
by which prophets were ac- 



346 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



tuated, i68ff., 175, 266; cur- 
rent views on the question not 
substantiated, i7off., cf. 87L; 
Jeremiah's object in having 
his past prophecies rehearsed 
by Baruch, 17 2L, cf. 2045.; 
"literary prophecy," appro- 
priate term, i74f.; contrast 
between older and literary 
prophets, i7sf. 

Prophetic preaching, vital factor 
of, sff., 124, i68ff., 175, 177, 
cf. 176 

Prophetic writings, relation to 
oral preaching, 87ft., 221; lit- 
erary character of, goi. 

Prophets, literary, circumstances 
marking their appearance, 5; 
attitude of their contempora- 
ries to, 29, 57, 67, 174, 2661., 
296, cf. 35; of later ages, 36; 
distance in religious views 
separating them from the 
people, 177, i86f., 255, 296, 
305; not concerned with the 
politics of the day, 6 if., see 
Isaiah; cf. 136; contrasted with 
the older prophets, 175; pro- 
fessional or official, the repre- 
sentatives of official religion, 
29, 34, 143, 197, n. 1; op- 
ponents of the literary proph- 
ets, 29; denounced by the 
latter, 29, 30L, 143L 

Prophet, true and false, accord- 
ing to the Deuteronomic stand- 
ard, 321., 35, 44; according to 
literary prophets' standard, 
3of., I43fl. 

Queen dowager, rank of, 179 



Rechabites, 160; flight of, to 
Jerusalem, 45 

Religion, character and purpose 
of, in ancient Israel, 321; 
prophets' conception of, 322 

Retribution, spiritual, see Jere- 
miah 

Revelation, see Inspiration 

Rigveda, view taken of sacrifices 
in the, 314 

Sabbath-observance, 51 

Salmanassar IV, 270, 272 

Samuel, 143, n. 1 

Sargon, 27ofL, 295, n. 3 

Sennacherib, 27if.; invasion of 
Judah by, 89, 254, 268, 291; 
blockade of Jerusalem, 29of., 
295, n. 3 

Seven, the number, 194, n. 1 

Solomon, 3L 

Stock phrases, 228, 245L 

Style, Biblical, or Oriental, fun- 
damental trait of, 37, 9 iff.; 
examples of this style in Occi- 
dental literature, 93ff.; illus- 
trations of, in prophetic litera- 
ture, 37, 99, 100, 115, 117, 119, 
182, 191, 196 

Syro-Ephraimitic campaign, 89, 
169, 266, 269 

Talmud, view taken of sacrifices 
in the, 3i4f. 

Text-omissions, method of copy- 
ists in dealing with, n6f., n. 2, 
260, n. 2, 261, n. 1, 288f. 

Tiglath-Pileser III, 2701!.; in- 
troduces system of transplan- 
tation, 272 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



347 



Tongues, Gift of (Speaking with), 

148L 
"Torah (revelation) of God," 

connotation of> 12L, n. 
Transcendence of God, 146L, 148 
Tribal responsibility, 3 2 if. 

Urijah, contemporary prophet of 
Jeremiah, 27, 36L, 41, 170 

"Voice, the still small," 161, n. 1, 
326 

Wadi of the Araba, the, 234, n. 2 
"Word of God," connotation of, 
i2f., n. 

YHWH, preprophetic concep- 
tion of, 114, 158, 189, 228, 238, 



305L, 320; His worship, local 
limitation of, 320L 

Zachariah, 3, 5, 6f.; writings of, 
6, 163, 174 

Zedekiah, 27, 52ff., 63f., 72; con- 
templated revolt against Baby- 
lon, 78f., n. 3; legend of his 
journey to Babylon, 79, n. 3; 
unhistoric picture of, 78f., cf. 
64 

Zedekiah b. Kanaanah, 148 

Zephaniah, priest, 87 

Zion- Jerusalem, inviolable sanc- 
tity of, 35, 103, n. 2, 197, n. 2, 
293; superiority of, to the 
other YHWH-sanctuaries, 

228f. 



GRAMMATICAL AND LEXICOGRAPHICAL 
OBSERVATIONS 



'abhar b e , equivocal as to inten- 
tion implied, 2i6f., n. 
Accusative of specification, 122, 

n. 1, 214L, n. 4 
'al l e, aeraekh app e kha (Jer. XV, 

15), construction of, 98 
'alti min ha'araes (Hos. II, 2), 

252 
'aqobh (Jer. XVII, 9), 106, n. 2 
' a saer recitativum, 127, n. 2 
'astir (Jer. XXXVI, 5), 4of. 
Asyndeton, 180, n. 1, 193 
'az (Jer. XI, 18), denoting conse- 
quence, 118 

basar (Jer. XXV, 31, XLV, 4), 
49, n. 1, 208, n. 1 

Circumstantial clause, 127, 191, 
n. 1, 248 

Ellipsis, 14, n. 3, 100, n. 2 and 3, 

no, 120, n. 2, 196, n. 1, 199, 

n. 1, 214, n. 3, 215 
'em bahtir (Jer. XV, 8), 192L 
Emphatic indetermination, 107, 

n. 1, 284, n. 1 
Emphatic infinitive, 107, n. 1, 

186, n. 1 

gar a 1 with l e personae, no 
Generic article, 231 

hazkirti laggojim (Jer. IV, 16), 
199, n. 1 



hinne, in sentence-ellipsis, 199, 

n. 1 
hodi'ani (Jer. XI, 18), 118 

Imperfect of reiterated action, 
12, n. 3, 18, n. 2; of progressive 
duration, 154 

Impersonal construction, 181, 
n. 1 

'in, emphatic particle, 36, 327ft. 

Infinitive of active stems, two- 
fold voice of, 107, n. 

'ittakh (Jer. XII, 3) qualificative, 
18, n. 3 

jahwce jis'ag, meaning and origin 

of, 2iif., n. 
jislah (Am. V, 6), 214, n. 3 
Jussive with wa consecutive, 54, 

n., 145, n. 1 

ken, verbal adjective, 214, n. 4; 

expletive, 2i4f., n. 4 
ki, consecutive, in a negative 

sentence, 35, n. 1 
ki, introductory, 188, 199, n. 1, 

214, n. 1 

loq e him l e sonam, 148L 

malethi (Mic. Ill, 8), 144, n. 
male (Eccl. VIII, n, Est. VII, 
S), 144, n. 



349 



35° 



GRAMMATICAL OBSERVATIONS 



massd (Jer. XVII, 19-27, Neh. 

XIII, 15-22), 50 
misnce (Jer. XVII, 18), nof. 
mosa s e phathai (Jer. XVII, 16), 

107L, n. 

Nominal sentence expressing 
wish, 108 

Object of preceding verb con- 
strued with following verb, 
48, n. 1, 145, n. 1, 248, cf. 190, 
n. 2 

Object, implied, construed with 
following verb, 186, n. 1 

'orhoth, 188 

paen, in sentence-ellipsis, 214, 

n. 3 
paJfdu ael, 42 



Potential participle, 26, 75, 77, 
108L, 182, 184, 202, 283, n. 3 

raq (Am. Ill, 12), intensive force, 
307f., n. 

sabha c al, 282 

Subject of preceding sentence 
construed as object with verb 
of following sentence, and 
vice versa, 51, 182, n. 3, 205, 
n. 1, cf. 125, n. 4 

Suffix, 2nd sing., impersonal 
construction of, 199, n. 2 

'iilai, denoting a conjectural 

case, 204L 
'usmero'a 'ah^re, logi. 

Za'am (Jer. XV, 17), 100, n. 2 
Zeugma, 144, n. 



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AMOS, HOSEA and MICAH 

Edited with an introduction, notes and glossary by Professor M. P. 
Smith. Uniform with the other books of the series. 

Cloth, i2mo, $1.00 net 

This commentary is one of the most important yet published in the 
popular series to which it belongs. It is distinguished by a number 
of distinctive features. In the first place the text of Hosea is printed 
as poetry. There is further evidenced a clear recognition of the fact 
that the book of Hosea is a growth; a careful and full analysis shows 
the progress of its thought. Again Hosea' 's marital experiences are 
given a fresh interpretation. And finally an endeavor is made to 
show the vital relation between the messages of these prophets and 
the needs of the times in which they lived. The notes for the volume 
are brief but adequate. They indicate the more important differences 
in the various great translations and embody the results of the latest 
and best scholarship, with a total absence of technicalities of language. 



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A NEW BOOK BY DR. N. D. HILLIS 

The Story of Phaedrus: How We 
Got the Greatest Book in the 
World 

By NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS 

With illustrations and decorations in color and black 
and white 

Decorated cloth, i2mo, $1.25 net 

The thought of this little masterpiece is as exquisite as 
the way in which it is worked out is clever. The greatest 
book is, of course, the Bible, or rather that portion of it 
which has to do with Christ and His disciples. How the 
various gospels and chronicles were collected is Dr. Hillis's 
theme. In effect it is a story setting forth the labor of a 
certain literary slave to whose untiring efforts the final 
assembling of the records of Christianity is due. Whether 
the facts actually were as Dr. Hillis so dramatically pre- 
sents them will not trouble the reader; there is so much of 
beauty in the presentation of the idea, so much real insight 
into the character of that far-off time, that one will be 
quite willing to accept it for what it is — a charming idyl of 
a possibility. 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 









MAR 21939 



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